Contact density and hyperfine splitting of positronium in naphthalene

Abstract

The contact density |Ψ(0)|2 and the hyperfine splitting of positronium in naphthalene have been determined by means of a magnetic quenching experiment. Results show that the perturbing effect of the medium on the hyperfine splitting is not interpretable as a change of the contact density alone, since on passing from vacuum to the medium, the contact density and the splitting do not scale together. The first is reduced by a factor of 0.25, the second by a factor of 0.067. A simple phenomenological model is presented.