arXiv subjects

E. Stephan

Publications and source records attributed to E. Stephan.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2025

Three-Nucleon Dynamics in the dp breakup collisions at 190 MeV/nucleon using the WASA detector at COSY-J\"{u}lich

The differential cross section for the $^{1}$H$(d,pp)n$ breakup reaction at deuteron beam energy of 380 MeV has been determined with high precision for 189 angular configurations of outgoing protons in the region of forward laboratory angles. The cross section data were compared to theoretical predictions based on the state-of-the-art nucleon-nucleon potentials, combined with a three-nucleon force, the Coulomb interaction or carried out in a relativistic approach. In the region of the lowest differential cross section, the discrepancy between the data and the theoretical predictions is observed, also in the case of relativistic calculations.

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arXiv2025

Measurement of the $^{40}$Ar(e,e$^{\prime}$) elastic scattering cross section with a novel gas-jet target

We report on a measurement of elastic electron scattering on argon performed with a novel cryogenic gas-jet target at the Mainz Microtron accelerator MAMI. The luminosity is estimated with the thermodynamical parameters of the target and by comparison to a calculation in distorted-wave Born approximation. The cross section, measured at new momentum transfers of 1.24 fm$^{-1}$ and 1.55 fm$^{-1}$ is in agreement with previous experiments performed with a traditional high-pressure gas target, as well as with modern ab-initio calculations employing state-of-the-art nuclear forces from chiral effective field theory. The nearly background-free measurement highlights the optimal properties of the gas-jet target for elements heavier than hydrogen, enabling new applications in hadron and nuclear physics.

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arXiv2024

Experimental studies of the three nucleon system dynamics in the proton induced deuteron breakup at 108 MeV

The differential cross sections for the $^2$H(p,pp)n reaction have been measured for 84 angular configurations of the outgoing protons in the range of polar angles from 13 to 33 degrees with a proton beam of 108 MeV. Data have been collected in the Cyclotron Center Bronowice (CCB) at the Institute of Nuclear Physics PAS in Cracow, using the BINA detector setup. Analysis leading to determination of the breakup cross section values is described. Absolute normalization is obtained by normalization to the simultaneously measured $^2$H(p,d)p scattering events.Experimental results are compared to the state-of-the-art theoretical calculations. Global analysis shows significant influence of the Coulomb interaction and small effects of three nucleon force in the studied phase space region.

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arXiv2023

Nuclear density dependence of polarization transfer in quasi-elastic ${\rm A}(\vec{e},e' \vec{p})$ reactions

The ratio of the transverse and longitudinal component of polarization transfer to protons in the quasi-elastic $(\vec{e}, e^{\prime} \vec{p}\,)$ reaction, $P^{\prime}_x/P^{\prime}_z$, is sensitive to the proton's electromagnetic form factor ratio, $G_E/G_M$. To explore density-dependent in-medium modifications, a comparison of polarization transfer ratios involving protons from distinct nuclear shells, each with different local nuclear densities, has been proposed. In this study, we present such comparisons between four shells, $1s_{1/2}$, $1p_{3/2}$ in $^{12}\mathrm{C}$ and $1d_{3/2}$, $2s_{1/2}$ in $^{40}\mathrm{Ca}$. In an effort to account for other many-body effects that may differ between shells, we use a state-of-the-art relativistic distorted-wave impulse-approximation (RDWIA) calculation and present the double ratios, $(P^{\prime}_x/P^{\prime}_z)_{\rm Data}/(P^{\prime}_x/P^{\prime}_z)_{\rm RDWIA}$ as well as the super ratios, $\left[(P^{\prime}_x/P^{\prime}_z)_{\rm A}/(P^{\prime}_x/P^{\prime}_z)_{\rm B}\right]_{\rm Data}/\left[(P^{\prime}_x/P^{\prime}_z)_{\rm A}/(P^{\prime}_x/P^{\prime}_z)_{\rm B}\right]_{\rm RDWIA}$, for chosen shells A and B, as a function of effective local nuclear densities. We find that double ratios for individual shells show a dependence on the probed effective nuclear densities. Studying the ratios, we observed a systematic variation between pairs of higher- and lower-density shells.

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arXiv2023

Measurement of polarization transfer in the quasi-elastic $^{40}{\rm Ca}(\vec{e},e' \vec{p})$ process

Polarization transfer to a bound proton in polarized electron knock-out reactions, $\mathrm{A}(\vec{e},e^{\prime}\vec{p})$, is a powerful tool to look for in-medium modification of the bound proton. It requires comparison to calculations which consider the many-body effects accompanying the quasi-free process. We report here measured components $P_x^{\prime}$, $P_z^{\prime}$, and their ratio $P_x^{\prime}/P_z^{\prime}$, of polarization transfer to protons bound in $^{40}\mathrm{Ca}$, which is described well by the shell model and for which reliable calculations are available. While the calculations capture the essence of the data, our statistical precision allows us to observe deviations which cannot be explained by simple scaling, including by varying the proton electromagnetic form factor ratio $G_E/G_M$. We further explore the deviations of the ratio of the polarization transfer components from that of a free proton, $(P_x^{\prime}/P_z^{\prime})_{\rm A}/(P_x^{\prime}/P_z^{\prime})_{\rm H}$, and its dependence on the bound-proton virtuality.

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arXiv2021

Precision measurements of differential cross sections and analyzing powers in elastic deuteron-deuteron scattering at 65 MeV/nucleon

We present measurements of differential cross sections and analyzing powers for the elastic 2H(~d; d)d scattering process. The data were obtained using a 130 MeV polarized deuteron beam. Cross sections and spin observables of the elastic scattering process were measured at the AGOR facility at KVI using two independent setups, namely BINA and BBS. The data harvest at setups are in excellent agreement with each other and allowed us to carry out a thorough systematic analysis to provide the most accurate data in elastic deuteron-deuteron scattering at intermediate energies. The results can be used to confront upcoming state-of-the-art calculations in the four-nucleon scattering domain, and will, thereby, provide further insights in the dynamics of three- and four-nucleon forces in few-nucleon systems.

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arXiv2020

A comprehensive analysis of differential cross sections and analyzing powers in the proton-deuteron break-up channel at 135 MeV

A selection of measured cross sections and vector analyzing powers, Ax and Ay, are presented for the pd break-up reaction. The data are taken with a polarized proton beam energy of 135 MeV using the Big Instrument for Nuclear-polarization Analysis (BINA) at KVI, the Netherlands. With this setup, Ax is extracted for the first time for a large range of energies as well as polar and azimuthal angles of the two outgoing protons. For most of the configurations, the results at small and large relative azimuthal angles differ in behavior when comparing experimental data with the theoretical calculations. We also performed a more global comparison of our data with theoretical calculations using a chi-square ($\chi^2$) analysis. The cross-section results show huge values of $\chi^2$/d.o.f.. The absolute values of $\chi^2$/d.o.f. for the components of vector analyzing powers, Ax and Ay, are smaller than the ones for the cross section, partly due to larger uncertainties for these observables. However, also for these observables no satisfactory agreement is found for all angular combinations. This implies that the present models of a three-nucleon force are not able to provide a satisfactory description of experimental data.

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arXiv2020

Search for the $\eta$ mesic $^3$He in the $pd\rightarrow d p \pi^{0}$ reaction with the WASA-at-COSY facility

The excitation function for the $pd\rightarrow$ $d p \pi^{0}$ reaction has been measured by WASA-at-COSY experiment with the aim of searching for $^{3}\hspace{-0.03cm}\mbox{He}$-$\eta$ mesic nuclei. The measurement in the vicinity of $\eta$ meson production was performed using a ramped proton beam. The data analysis and interpretation was carried out with the assumption that the $\eta$-mesic Helium decays via the formation of an intermediate N$^{*}$(1535) resonance. No direct signal of the $\eta$-mesic nucleus is observed in the excitation function. We determine a new improved upper limit for the total cross section for the bound state production and decay in the $pd\rightarrow$ $(^{3}\hspace{-0.03cm}\mbox{He}$-$\eta)_{bound} \rightarrow$ $d p \pi^{0}$ process. It varies between 13 nb to 24 nb for the bound state with width in the range $\Gamma \in (5,50)$ MeV.

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arXiv2020

A comprehensive study of analyzing powers in the proton-deuteron break-up channel at 135 MeV

A measurement of the analyzing powers for the $^2$H$(\vec{p},pp)n$ break-up reaction was carried out at KVI exploiting a polarized-proton beam at an energy of 135 MeV. The scattering angles and energies of the final-state protons were measured using the Big Instrument for Nuclear-polarization Analysis (BINA) with a nearly $4\pi$ geometrical acceptance. In this work, we analyzed a large number of kinematical geometries including forward-forward configurations in which both the final-state particles scatter to small polar angles and backward-forward configurations in which one of the final-state particles scatters to large polar angles. The results are compared with Faddeev calculations based on modern nucleon-nucleon (NN) and three-nucleon (3N) potentials. Discrepancies between polarization data and theoretical predictions are observed for configurations corresponding to small relative azimuthal angles between the two final-state protons. These configurations show a large sensitivity to 3N force effects.

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arXiv2020

Comprehensive measurements of cross sections and spin observables of the three-body break-up channel in deuteron-deuteron scattering at 65 MeV/nucleon

Detailed measurements of five-fold differential cross sections and a rich set of vector and tensor analyzing powers of the 2H(d; dp)n break-up process using polarized deuteron-beam energy of 65 MeV/nucleon with a liquid-deuterium target are presented. The experiment was conducted at the AGOR facility at KVI using the BINA 4Pi-detection system. We discuss the analysis procedure including a thorough study of the systematic uncertainties. The results can be used to examine upcoming state-of-the-art calculations in the four-nucleon scattering domain, and will, thereby, provide further insights into the dynamics of three- and four-nucleon forces in few-nucleon systems. The results of coplanar configurations are compared with the results of recent theoretical calculations based on the Single-Scattering Approximation (SSA). Through these comparisons, the validity of SSA approximation is investigated in the Quasi-Free (QF) region.

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arXiv2020

Measurement of differential cross sections for deuteron-proton breakup reaction at 160 MeV

Differential cross sections for deuteron breakup $^{1}H(d, pp)n$ reaction were measured for a large set of 243 geometrical configurations at the beam energy of 80 MeV/nucleon. The cross section data are normalized by the luminosity factor obtained on the basis of simultaneous measurement of elastic scattering channel and the existing cross section data for this process. The results are compared to the theoretical calculations modeling nuclear interaction with and without taking into account the three-nucleon force (3NF) and Coulomb interaction. In the validated region of the phase space both the Coulomb force and 3NF play an important role in a good description of the data. There are also regions, where the improvements of description due to including 3NF are not sufficient.

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arXiv2020

Differential Cross Sections for Neutron-Proton Scattering in the Region of the $d^*(2380)$ Dibaryon Resonance

Differential cross sections have been extracted from exclusive and kinematically complete high-statistics measurements of quasifree polarized $\vec{n}p$ scattering performed in the energy region of the $d^*(2380)$ dibaryon resonance covering the the range of beam energies $T_n$ = 0.98 - 1.29 GeV ($\sqrt s$ = 2.32 - 2.44 GeV). The experiment was carried out with the WASA-at-COSY setup having a polarized deuteron beam impinged on the hydrogen pellet target and utilizing the quasifree process $dp \to np + p_{spectator}$. That way the $np$ differential cross section $\sigma(\Theta)$ was measured over a large angular range. The obtained angular distributions complement the corresponding analyzing power $A_y(\Theta)$ measurements published previously. A SAID partial-wave analysis incorporating the new data strengthens the finding of a resonance pole in the coupled $^3D_3 - ^3G_3$ waves.

hep-ex↗

arXiv2019

Study of Three-Nucleon Dynamics in the dp breakup collisions using the WASA detector

Differential cross section for the 1H(d,pp)n breakup reaction at deuteron beam energy of 340 MeV has been measured with the use of WASA detector at COSY-Juelich. The set of proton-proton coincidences registered at Forward Detector has been analysed on dense grid of kinematic variables, giving in total around 5600 data points. The cross section data are compared to theoretical predictions based on the state-of-the-art nucleon-nucleon potentials, combined with three-nucleon force, Coulomb interaction or carried out in a relativistic regime.

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arXiv2019

Analyzing powers in $d(\vec{p}, pp)n$ at intermediate and large scattering angles at $190$~MeV

Understanding of the exact nature of three-nucleon forces is the most challenging topic in the field of nuclear physics. Three-nucleon break-up reaction is a good tool to look into the underlying dynamics of the nuclear force, thanks to its rich kinematical phase space which has different levels of sensitivity to three-nucleon force effects. The recent studies on few-nucleon systems have revealed that the current nuclear force models cannot describe nucleon-deuteron scattering data accurately. In the present work, the analyzing powers of the proton-deuteron break-up reaction obtained using a 190 MeV polarized proton beam will be discussed. We present for the first time the vector analyzing powers for the kinematics in which one of the protons scatters to intermediate and large scattering angles at this energy. The results show a fairly good agreement with various theoretical predictions for both intermediate and large scattering angles of the break-up phase space.

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arXiv2019

Search for eta mesic 3He with the WASA-at-COSY facility in the pd-> 3He 2gamma and pd-> 3He 6gamma reactions

We report on the experimental search for the bound state of an $\eta$ meson and $^{3}\hspace{-0.03cm}\mbox{He}$ nucleus performed using the WASA-at-COSY detector setup. In order to search for the $\eta$-mesic nucleus decay, the $pd\rightarrow$ $^{3}\hspace{-0.03cm}\mbox{He} 2\gamma$ and $pd\rightarrow$ $^{3}\hspace{-0.03cm}\mbox{He} 6\gamma$ channels have been analysed. These reactions manifest the direct decay of $\eta$ meson bound in $^{3}\hspace{-0.03cm}\mbox{He}$ nucleus. This non-mesonic decay channel has been considered for the first time. When taking into account only statistical errors, the obtained excitation functions reveal a slight indication for a possible bound state signal corresponding to an $^3$He-$\eta$ nucleus width $\Gamma$ above 20 MeV and binding energy $B_s$ between 0 and 15 MeV. However, the determined cross sections are consistent with zero in the range of the systematic uncertainty. Therefore, as final result we estimate only the upper limit for the cross section of the $\eta$-mesic $^{3}\hspace{-0.03cm}\mbox{He}$ nucleus formation followed by the $\eta$ meson decay which varies between $2$ nb and $15$ nb depending on possible bound state parameters.

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arXiv2019

Vector analyzing powers in the $d(p,pp)n$ and $d(p,{\rm{^{2}He}})n$ channels at 135 MeV

Vector analyzing powers, $A_x$ and $A_y$, of the proton-deuteron break-up reaction have been measured by using a polarized-proton beam at 135 MeV impinging on a liquid-deuterium target. For the experiment, the Big Instrument for Nuclear-polarization Analysis (BINA) was used at KVI, Groningen, the Netherlands. The data are compared to the predictions of Faddeev calculations using state-of-the-art two- and three-nucleon potentials. Our data are reasonably well described by calculations for the kinematical configurations at which the three-nucleon force (3NF) effect is predicted to be small. However, striking discrepancies are observed at specific configurations, in particular in the cases of symmetric configurations, where the relative azimuthal angle between the two protons is small which corresponds to the $d(p,{\rm{^{2}He}})n$ channel. The vector analyzing powers of these configurations are compared to the proton deuteron elastic scattering to study the spin-isospin sensitivity of the 3NF models. The results are compared to the earlier results of the proton-deuteron break-up reaction at 190 MeV proton-beam energy \cite{Mardanpour2010}. A disagreement is observed for both proton-beam energies between data and calculations which points to a deficiency in the treatment of spin-isospin part of the 3NF.

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arXiv2019

Investigation of the quasi-free domain in deuteron-deuteron break-up using spin observables

Precision measurements of vector and tensor analyzing powers of the $^{2}{\rm H}(\vec d,dp){n}$ break-up process for configurations in the vicinity of the quasi-free scattering regime with the neutron as spectator, are presented. These measurements are performed with a polarized deuteron-beam with an energy of 65 MeV/nucleon impinging on a liquid-deuterium target. The experiment was conducted at the AGOR facility at KVI using the BINA 4$\pi$-detection system. Events for which the final-state deuteron and proton are coplanar have been analyzed and the data have been sorted for various momenta of the missing neutron. In the limit of vanishing neutron momentum and at large deuteron-proton momentum transfer, the data agree well with the measured and theoretically predicted spin observables of the elastic deuteron-proton scattering process. The agreement deteriorates rapidly with increasing neutron momentum and/or decreasing momentum transfer from the deuteron beam to the outgoing proton. This study reveals the presence of a significant contribution of final-state interactions even at very small neutron momenta.

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arXiv2019

Studies of the Three-Body Breakup in Deuteron-Deuteron Collisions near the Quasi-Free Limit at 160 MeV

A set of differential cross section of the three-body $^{2}$H($d$,$dp$)$n$ breakup reaction at 160 MeV deuteron beam energy are presented for 147 kinematically complete configurations near the quasi-free scattering kinematics. The experiment was performed at KVI in Groningen, the Netherlands using the BINA detector. The cross-section data have been normalized to the $^{2}$H($d$,$d$)$^{2}$H elastic scattering cross section. The data are compared to the recent single-scattering approximation (SSA) calculations for three-cluster breakup in deuteron-deuteron collisions. Confronting the SSA predictions with the experimental data shows that SSA provides the correct order of magnitude of the cross-section data. The studied energy is probably too low to meet the SSA assumptions which prevents better accuracy of the description.

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