Pauli exclusion operator and binding energy of nuclear matter

Brueckner-Hartree-Fock calculations are performed for nuclear matter with a n exact treatment of the Pauli exclusion operator in the Bethe-Goldstone eq uation. The differences in the calculated binding energy, compared to the a ngle-average approximation, which is commonly used, are non-negligible. The se differences exhibit a specific density dependence, which shifts the calc ulated saturation point towards smaller densities. This effect is observed for various versions of modern models for the nucleon-nucleon interaction. [S0556-2813(99)02605-9].