Disentangling the Effects of Thickness of the Neutron Skin and Symmetry Potential in Nucleon Induced Reactions on Sn Isotopes

The effects of density dependence of symmetry energy and the thickness of the neutron skin in proton (neutron) induced reactions on Sn isotopes are investigated by means of the improved molecular dynamics model. The investigation shows that the target size dependence of the reaction cross sections for proton induced reactions on Sn isotopes is sensitive to the density dependence of the symmetry energy and less sensitive to the thickness of the neutron skin of the target nuclei, but that, for neutron induced reactions on Sn isotopes, it is less sensitive to the density dependence of the symmetry energy and sensitive to the thickness of the neutron skin of the target nucleus.