26–30 Jan 2015
Bormio, Italy
Europe/Berlin timezone

Cross section measurements of the elastic electron - deuteron scattering at MAMI

26 Jan 2015, 17:03
3m
Bormio, Italy

Bormio, Italy

Speaker

Yvonne Kohl (Johannes-Gutenberg-Universität Mainz, Institut für Kernphysik)

Description

The electromagnetic form factors of light nuclei provide a sensitive test of our understanding of nuclei. The deuteron in particular, as the only bound two-nucleon system, is a fundamental system that has received extensive attention in the past, by both theory and experiment. Because the deuteron has spin one, three form factors are needed to fully describe the electromagnetic structure of the deuteron. Especially the deuteron charge radius is a favourite observable to compare experiment and calculation. Recently, an extensive measurement campaign has been performed at MAMI (Mainzer Microtron) to determine the deuteron charge radius using elastic electron scattering - with the aim to halve the error compared to previous such experiments. The experiment took place at the 3-spectrometer facility of the A1-collaboration. Cross section measurements of the elastic electron-deuteron scattering have been performed for 180 different kinematic settings in the low momentum transfer region. From these, the charge form factor can precisely be determined. Fitting the form factor with an appropiate fit function, the radius can then be determined from the slope at zero momentum transfer. The determined radius could then be used as a counterweight to the value obtained from the advanced atomic Lamb shift measurements, thus providing additional insight to the proton radius puzzle.

Primary author

Yvonne Kohl (Johannes-Gutenberg-Universität Mainz, Institut für Kernphysik)

Presentation materials