Consequences of neutron-proton interactions on backbending

Abstract
The influence of neutron-proton correlations on backbending is investigated in a single-j-shell model. It is shown that these correlations are quenched if the neutrons and protons fill a high-j intruder orbital asymmetrically. This is due to the repulsive neutron-proton correlation energy in these configurations and is responsible for the observed forking of the ground state band into proton and neutron S bands.