Fate of the neutron–deuteron virtual state as an Efimov level

The emergence of Efimov levels in a three-body system is investigated near the unitarity limit characterized by a resonant two-body interaction. No direct evidence of Efimov levels is seen in the three-nucleon system since the triton is the only physical bound state. We provide a model-independent analysis of nucleon–deuteron scattering at low energy by formulating a consistent effective field theory. We show that virtual states evolve into shallow bound states, which emerge as excited triton levels as we drive the system towards unitarity. Even though we consider this specific system, our results for the emergence of the Efimov levels are universal.