Impact of the nuclear mass uncertainties on the r process

Abstract

Based on a simple site-independent approach, we attempt to reproduce the solar r-process abundance with four nuclear mass models, and investigate the impact of the nuclear mass uncertainties on the r process. In this paper, we first analyze the reliability of an adopted empirical formula for β-decay half-lives which is a key ingredient for the r process. Then we apply four different mass tables to study the r-process nucleosynthesis together with the calculated β-decay half-lives, and the existing β-decay data from FRDM+QRPA is also considered for comparison. The numerical results show that the main features of the solar r-process pattern and the locations of the abundance peaks can be reproduced well via the r-process simulations. Moreover, we also find that the mass uncertainties can significantly affect the derived astrophysical conditions for the r-process site, and resulting in a remarkable impact on the r process.