Angular Distributions of High Energy Protons inelastically scattered by Light Nuclei

Abstract

The effect of the central optical potential in the quasi-elastic scattering of high energy nucleons is treated by the semi-classical approximation. For non-radial excitation of the nucleus the optical potential leads to a considerable angle-independent reduction in intensity. It also produces some forward scattering when two units of orbital angular momentum are communicated to the nucleus by the scattered particle. The angular distributions for radial nuclear excitation are more seriously distorted by the optical potential; the main effect here consists in a more or less angle-independent reduction in intensity of the diffraction peaks, and the appearance of a large extra peak in the forward direction.