Elastic scattering, polarization and absorption of relativistic antiprotons on nuclei
Abstract
We perform Glauber model calculations of the antiproton-nucleus elastic and quasielastic scattering and absorption in the beam momentum range 0.510 GeV/c. A good agreement of our calculations with available LEAR data and with earlier Glauber model studies of the p A elastic scattering allows us to make predictions at the beam momenta of 10 GeV/c, i.e. at the regime of the PANDA experiment at FAIR. The comparison with the proton-nucleus elastic scattering cross sections shows that the diffractive minima are much deeper in the p A case due to smaller absolute value of the ratio of the real-to-imaginary part of the elementary elastic amplitude. Significant polarization signal for p A elastic scattering at 10 GeV/c is expected. We have also revealed a strong dependence of the p A absorption cross section on the slope parameter of the transverse momentum dependence of the elementary pN amplitude. The p A optical potential is discussed.