Stellar Astrophysics and a Fundamental Description of Thermonuclear Reactions ? 04-ERD-058 Final Report

Report on the progress achieved in 04-ERD-058. The primary goal of the project was to investigate new methods to provide a comprehensive understanding of how reactions between light nuclei proceed in hot, dense environments, such as stellar interiors. The project sought to develop an entirely new theoretical framework to describe the dynamics of nuclear collisions based on the fundamental nuclear interactions. Based on the new theoretical framework, new computational tools were developed to address specific questions in nuclear structure and reactions. A full study of the true nature of the three-nucleon interaction was undertaken within the formalism of effective field theory. We undertook a preliminary theoretical study of the quantum corrections to electron screening in thermal plasmas to resolve a discrepancy exhibited in previous theoretical approaches.