Microscopic analysis of the breathing mode in 40Ca and 58Ni

Recent experimental studies of the giant electric resonance region in ⁵⁸Ni and ⁴⁰Ca with inelastically scattered α-particles of energy E_α= 240 MeV are analyzed within a microscopic nuclear structure model. The model includes the continuum RPA and more complex 1p1h⊗phonon configurations. By superimposing the contributions of different multipoles up to L = 4 we obtain good agreement with the newest (reanalyzed) data for the isoscalar monopole strength and for the total (α,α′) cross section in ⁵⁸Ni. Agreement with experiment for the isoscalar monopole resonance in ⁴⁰Ca is obtained too. We emphasize the necessity of using microscopic transition densities and discuss consequences for the analyses of such experiments in light and medium mass nuclei. It is shown that the gross structure of the isoscalar monopole resonance in ⁴⁰Ca is caused by the 1p1h⊗phonon configurations. Received: 23 December 1999 / Revised version: 28 February 2000