2026/02/05 by Jacquelyn Noronha-Hostler · 1 voice · 1 citation
Physics and Astronomy · #nucl-th #astro-ph.HE #nucl-ex
Finite nuclei constrain the dense-matter equation of state (EOS), yet they are self-bound quantum droplets far from the thermodynamic limit. Motivated by an analogy to quantum dots, we show that the nuclear chart nevertheless defines a mesoscopic regime in which mesoscopic chemical-potential analogs \μB,μQ,μS\ can be extracted directly from nuclear and hypernuclear binding energies after consistent Coulomb subtraction. These are discrete finite-difference response functions -- local slopes of the strong-interaction energy landscape -- not equilibrium grand-canonical chemical potentials. The nuclear chart itself supplies an "ensemble of nearby droplets": finite differences across neighboring nuclei suppress shell- and pairing-scale oscillations while retaining the smooth bulk trend, producing robust slopes without a macroscopic limit. Thus, the data provide empirical local derivatives that any strangeness-enabled EOS must reproduce near saturation. Mapping the measured (hyper)nuclear landscape at T≃ 0, we find smooth, numerically stable responses, including a large, negative strangeness chemical-potential analog, and we identify specific hypernuclear measurements that can directly test and sharpen these EOS constraints.