Primary rainbow and Airy minima in 12 C + 12 C elastic scattering with families of non-monotonic potentials

The experimental differential cross section of the 12 C + 12 C elastic scattering over a wide laboratory energy scale 25 ⩽ E lab ⩽ 360 MeV are analyzed within the framework of the optical model (OM) using non-monotonic (NM) nucleus–nucleus potential. The real parts of the NM potentials are derived from the energy density functional (EDF) formalism with the sudden approximation embodying the Pauli exclusion principle and the imaginary parts are taken as phenomenology. The diffractive and the refractive scattering with Airy structures in the whole angular region of the 12 C + 12 C elastic scattering in the above mentioned energy range are found profoundly successful in OM with the NM nucleus–nucleus potentials in five of different potential families. All the families at lower energies converge at 240 MeV to the unique potential family starting with the EDF potential. This, in conjunction with our recent findings for the 16 O + 16 O system in Islam et al (2021 J. Phys. G 48 075109), not only verifies the Goldberg criterion for elimination of discrete potential ambiguities for NM potentials, but also establishes that this leads uniquely to the EDF family. The 90° excitation function is also successfully reproduced with extension using NM potentials. The near- and far-side (N/F) decomposition of total elastic scattering amplitude has also been studied using our NM potentials.