Three-Body Scattering without Partial Waves

Abstract

The Faddeev equation for three-body scattering at arbitrary energies is formulated in momentum space and directly solved in terms of momentum vectors without employing a partial wave decomposition. In its simplest form the Faddeev equation for identical bosons is a three-dimensional integral equation in five variables, magnitudes of relative momenta and angles. The elastic differential cross section, semi-exclusive d(N,N') cross sections and total cross sections of both elastic and breakup processes in the intermediate energy range up to about 1 GeV are calculated based on a Malfliet-Tjon type potential, and the convergence of the multiple scattering series is investigated in every case. In general a truncation in the first or second order in the two-body t-matrix is quite insufficient.