Nucleon microscopy in proton-nucleus scattering via analysis of bremsstrahlung emission: role of incoherent emission

TL;DR

This paper introduces a new model for proton-nucleus bremsstrahlung that emphasizes incoherent emission, improving agreement with experimental data and enabling better probing of proton internal structure during nuclear scattering.

Contribution

A novel bremsstrahlung model focusing on incoherent emission in proton-nucleus scattering, enhancing data agreement and offering new insights into proton internal structure.

Findings

Incoherent bremsstrahlung significantly improves data agreement.

Including proton form factors further enhances model accuracy.

Model sensitivity enables detailed study of proton internal structure.

Abstract

We study electromagnetic form factors of protons in proton-nucleus scattering via analysing of experimental cross-sections of accompanying bremsstrahlung photons. A new bremsstrahlung model for proton-nucleus scattering is developed, where a main focus is given on incoherent bremsstrahlung that has not been considered previously. In analysis we choose experimental bremsstrahlung data of $p$ + $^{197}$Au scattering at proton beam energy of 190 MeV obtained by TAPS collaboration. We find the following. (1) Inclusion of incoherent emission to calculations improves agreements with experimental data essentially, contribution of incoherent bremsstrahlung is essentially larger than coherent one. (2) Inclusion of form factors of the scattered proton improves agreement with experimental data in comparison with calculations with coherent and incoherent contributions without form factors. (3) Sensitivity of model in study of form factors of the scattered proton is high. This demonstrates a new opportunity to study internal structure of protons under influence of nuclear forces in nuclear scattering.