High-precision measurement of the kaonic hydrogen 1s level shift and width with SIDDHARTA-2

Abstract

Kaonic atoms provide a unique experimental probe of strong interaction in the low-energy regime. In particular, the strong-interaction-induced shift ($\varepsilon_{1\text{s}}$) and width ($Γ_{1\text{s}}$) of kaonic hydrogen directly constrain the low-energy antikaon-nucleon ($\bar{K}N$) interaction at threshold and the theoretical description of the $Λ$(1405) resonance. We report a new high-precision measurement of kaonic hydrogen X-ray transitions performed by the SIDDHARTA-2 experiment at the DA$Φ$NE collider (INFN-LNF), based on an integrated luminosity of 237 pb$^{-1}$. The extracted values, $\varepsilon_{1\text{s}}\,=\,-303.0\,\pm\,17.0\,(stat.)\,\pm\,2.5\,(syst.)$ eV and $Γ_{1\text{s}}\,=\,607\,\pm\,62\,(stat.)\,\pm\,6\,(syst.)$ eV, represent the most precise determination to date, improving the precision by approximately a factor-of-two with respect to the previous SIDDHARTA measurement. These results significantly tighten the experimental constraints on theoretical description of the low-energy $\bar{K}N$ interaction.