Relativistic description of the Fermi motion effects on deuterium targets

Abstract

A comprehensive analysis of the inconsistencies of the conventional, non-relativistic approach, which has been used so far in the extraction of neutron data from deuterium targets, is given. A new approach dealing with the smearing effects, due to the nucleon's Fermi motion inside the deuteron, is developed as an alternative to the conventional one. This new approach is a spin-less, relativistic, simple and consistent approach. A new covariant model of the elastic electromagnetic form factors of the deuteron in the impulse approximation is also presented. The treatment includes spin and allows for a possibility of determining completely the two elastic structure functions.