Correlations between the nuclear breathing mode energy and properties of asymmetric nuclear matter

Based on microscopic Hartree-Fock + random phase approximation calculations with Skyrme interactions, we study the correlations between the nuclear breathing mode energy $E_{ISGMR}$ and properties of asymmetric nuclear matter with a recently developed analysis method. Our results indicate that the $E_{ISGMR}$ of $^{208}$Pb exhibits moderate correlations with the density slope $L$ of the symmetry energy and the isoscalar nucleon effective mass $m_{s,0}^{\ast}$ besides a strong dependence on the incompressibility $K_{0}$ of symmetric nuclear matter. Using the present empirical values of $L=60\pm 30$ MeV and $m_{s,0}^{\ast}=(0.8\pm 0.1)m$, we obtain a theoretical uncertainty of about $\pm 16$ MeV for the extraction of $K_{0}$ from the $E_{ISGMR}$ of $^{208}$Pb. Furthermore, we find the $E_{ISGMR}$ difference between $^{100}$Sn and $^{132}$Sn strongly correlates with $L$ and thus provides a potentially useful probe of the symmetry energy.