ABSTRACT
In its most simple form, the nuclear shell model only describes the motion of nucleons as independent particles in an average field. Even with the residual interactions, as discussed extensively in chapter 11, the nuclear shell model with a spherical average field is not always a very appropriate starting point from which to describe the coherent motion of the many valence nucleons, except in some schematic models. Still, the nuclear shell model, especially as used before, contains a serious predictive power when discussing nuclei not too far removed from the closed-shell configurations.
