Lowest-order constrained-variation calculations of binding energies for symmetric and asymmetric nuclear matter

Abstract Ground-state energies of symmetric and asymmetric nuclear matter are calculated by a “lowestorder constrained-variation” (LOCV) method. We improve the original LOCV method by introducing new correlation operators capable of treating tensor interactions in all partial waves, and we include all partial waves of the Reid soft-core potential. It is also proved that within this formalism a given nucleon may be tensor correlated with 1 2 N and not with N other particles in a system of N nucleons if only two-body correlations are allowed.