Finite volume effects in low-energy neutron–deuteron scattering

Abstract

We present a lattice calculation of neutron–deuteron scattering at very low energies and investigate in detail the impact of the topological finite-volume corrections. Our calculations are carried out in the framework of pionless effective field theory at leading order in the low-energy expansion. Using lattice sizes and a lattice spacing comparable to those employed in nuclear lattice simulations, we find that the topological volume corrections must be taken into account in order to obtain accurate results for the neutron–deuteron S-wave scattering lengths.