Analytical solutions for the Bohr Hamiltonian with the Woods-Saxon potential

Approximate analytical solutions in closed form are obtained for the five-dimensional Bohr Hamiltonian with the Woods-Saxon potential, taking advantage of the Pekeris approximation and the exactly solvable one-dimensional extended Woods-Saxon potential with a dip near its surface. Comparison with the data for several gamma-unstable and prolate deformed nuclei indicates that the potential can describe well the ground state and gamma(1) bands of many prolate deformed nuclei corresponding to a large enough 'well size' and diffuseness, while it fails in describing the beta(1) bands, due to its lack of a hard core, as well as in describing gamma-unstable nuclei, because of the small 'well size' and diffuseness they exhibit.