Emission time sequence of neutrons and protons as probes of α-clustering structure *

Abstract

Abstract Neutron–proton momentum correlation functions are constructed from a three-body photodisintegration channel, i.e., core+n+p, and used to explore the spatial-time information of the non-clustering Woods–Saxon spherical structure as well as the -clustering structures of or based on an extended quantum molecular dynamics model. The emission time sequence of neutrons and protons is indicated by the ratio of velocity-gated neutron–proton correlation functions, demonstrating its sensitivity to -clustering structures. This work sheds light on a new probe for -clustering structures.