Impact of pairing correlations on electron capture cross-sections and nuclear partition functions of 94,96,98,100Mo in astrophysical environment

This study investigates the effects of nuclear pairing gaps on Gamow–Teller (GT[Formula: see text]) strength distributions, nuclear partition functions (NPFs) and electron capture cross-sections (ECCs) for neutron-rich molybdenum isotopes ([Formula: see text]Mo, [Formula: see text]Mo, [Formula: see text]Mo and [Formula: see text]Mo) under astrophysical conditions. The traditional pairing gap [Formula: see text] (=12/[Formula: see text]), the four-point [Formula: see text] and five-point [Formula: see text] empirical pairing gap formulae were employed in our nuclear model to explore their impact on [Formula: see text]-decay properties of selected Mo even–even isotopes. Larger pairing gaps, witnessed in the [Formula: see text] scheme, led to enhancement in the calculated GT[Formula: see text] strength and ECCs, especially at higher energies. NPFs were altered up to 14.64% with changing pairing gaps. Total ECCs (TECCs) showed a significant dependence on temperature and pairing gaps. TECCs of heavier isotopes of Mo were affected more by a change of pairing gaps. The TECCs are altered by 4% and 16% for [Formula: see text]Mo and [Formula: see text]Mo, respectively, with changing pairing gaps. The TECCs increased by approximately two orders of magnitude as the temperature changed from 0.5[Formula: see text]MeV to 1.5[Formula: see text]MeV, with heavier isotopes displaying greater sensitivity to pairing effects. Our results highlight the importance of accurately modeling thermal and pairing interactions in astrophysical environment such as core collapse supernovae.