Bayesian uncertainty quantification for nuclear matter incompressibility

Within a Bayesian statistical framework using the standard Skyrme-Hartree-Fock model, the maximum a posteriori (MAP) values and uncertainties of nuclear matter incompressibility and isovector interaction parameters are inferred from the experimental data of giant resonances and neutron-skin thicknesses of typical heavy nuclei. With the uncertainties of the isovector interaction parameters constrained by the data of the isovector giant dipole resonance and the neutron-skin thickness, we have obtained K0 = 223+7-8 MeV at 68% confidence level using the data of the isoscalar giant monopole resonance in 208Pb measured at the Research Center for Nuclear Physics (RCNP), Japan, and at the Texas A&M University, USA. Although the corresponding 120Sn data gives a MAP value for K0 about 5 MeV smaller than the 208Pb data, there are significant overlaps in their posterior probability distribution functions.