Low-$Q^2$ elastic electron-proton scattering using a gas jet target

TL;DR

This study reports on low-$Q^2$ elastic electron-proton scattering measurements using a novel cryogenic gas jet target, confirming consistency with existing data and demonstrating the target's feasibility for future experiments.

Contribution

Introduces a new cryogenic gas jet target for low-$Q^2$ scattering experiments and validates its effectiveness through experimental measurements.

Findings

Measured proton electric form factor in $0.01 \, Q^2 \, 0.045$ (GeV/c)$^2$ range

Results are consistent with previous measurements

Demonstrated feasibility of gas jet target for high-resolution scattering experiments

Abstract

In this paper, we describe an experiment measuring low-$Q^2$ elastic electron-proton scattering using a newly developed cryogenic supersonic gas jet target in the A1 three-spectrometer facility at the Mainz Microtron. We measured the proton electric form factor within the four-momentum transfer range of $0.01\le Q^2 \le 0.045(\text{GeV/c})^2$. The experiment showed consistent results with the existing measurements. The data we collected demonstrated the feasibility of the gas jet target and the potential of future scattering experiments using high-resolution spectrometers with this gas jet target.