Spin Polarization in $\gamma d \to \vec{n}p$ at Low Energies with a Pionless Effective Field Theory

Abstract

With the use of pionless effective field theory including dibaryon fields, we study the $\gamma d \to \vec{n} p$ reaction for the laboratory photon energy $E_\gamma^{lab}$ ranging from threshold to 30 MeV. Our main goal is to calculate the neutron polarization $P_{y'}$ defined as $P_{y'} = (\sigma_+ - \sigma_-)/(\sigma_+ + \sigma_-)$, where $\sigma_+$ and $\sigma_-$ are the differential cross sections for the spin-up and spin-down neutrons, respectively, along the axis perpendicular to the reaction plane. We also calculate the total cross section as well as the differential cross section $\sigma(\theta)$, where $\theta$ is the colatitude angle. Although the results for the total and differential cross sections are found to agree reasonably well with the data, the results for $P_{y'}$ show significant discrepancy with the experiment. We comment on this discrepancy.