Nucleon recoil polarization in electromagnetic quasi-free knockout including two-body currents

Abstract

Polarization observables are considered for the outgoing nucleon knocked out in quasi-free electron scattering. The theoretical framework is based on the one-photon exchange approximation and the electromagnetic current of the target nucleus is built with one- and two-body contributions coming from meson-exchange currents and isobar configurations in intermediate nuclear states. Specific calculations are presented for both proton and neutron knockout, taking an 16O target nucleus as an example to set the scale for possible experiments. The sensitivity to final-state interactions, mesonic effects and isobaric configurations is discussed.