Shape and pairing fluctuation effects on neutrinoless double beta decay nuclear matrix elements

Abstract

Nuclear matrix elements (NME) for the most promising candidates to detect neutrinoless double beta decay have been computed with energy density functional methods including deformation and pairing fluctuations explicitly on the same footing. The method preserves particle number and angular momentum symmetries and can be applied to any decay without additional fine tunings. The finite range density dependent Gogny force is used in the calculations. An increase of 10%-40% in the NME with respect to the ones found without the inclusion of pairing fluctuations is obtained, reducing the predicted half-lives of these isotopes.