Z.

Physik A Atoms and Nuclei 296, 371-376 (1980) Atoms

Zeitschrift
for Physik A
and Nuclei
9 by Springer-Verlag 1980

Cascade Model of Inelastic Interactions of ~-Particles with Nuclei

V.S. Barashencov and J.J. Musulmanbecov
Joint Institute for Nuclear Research, Dubna, USSR

F.G. Gereghi
Kishinev State University, Kishinev, USSR

Received February 26, 1980

High energy e-particle interactions with nuclei are considered as interference of cascades
initiated by mesons, nucleons and fragments of e-particle, which are produced in collisions
of e-particle with nucleons of the target nucleus. Nuclear depletion has been taken
into account during the interaction process. Emulsion and streamer chamber data of
e-particle interactions with light (Li, C, N, O, A1) and heavy (Cu, Ag, Br, Pb) nuclei
at the energy 3.64 GeV per nucleon have been analyzed. At the range of atomic numbers
A > 100 the discrepancy between theoretical calculations and experimental data becomes
noticeable.

Excluding the case of deuteron-nucleus reactions one
can consider e-nucleus interactions as the simplest
chance to test various models of nucleus-nucleus in-
teractions. Rather plentiful experimental data of e-
particle interactions at the energies of about few GeV
per nucleon and a wide range of target nuclei promote
this [1-10]. The interest to e-nucleus interactions is
stimulated by the problems of radiation protection
from cosmic rays and of influence of this radiation
on biological objects.*
In Refs. [11-13] it has been shown that the amplitude
of elastic e-nucleus collision can be considered as
a superposition of amplitudes for e-particle interact-
ing as a whole with separate nucleons inside of the
target nucleus. This approach simplifies the calcula-
tions and is in good agreement with experiments. For
the case of inelastic e-Nucleus interactions this ap-
proach has been considered in [14] in which there
has been obtained better agreement with experiments
than in cases of using more crude models [t5, 16]
where the initital helium ion has been considered as
a set of four uncorrelated nucleons and the changing
of nuclear density during the cascade process has not
been taken into account (the last effect is especially
important). However the consideration in [14] was
limited by the energies T ~ 5 0 - - 2 0 0 MeV per nuc-
* We are obliged to Dr. A.I. Vikhrov, Dr. Ju.G. Grigorov,
Dr. V.D. Dudkin for discussing of this question
leon, for which cosmic and accelerator data were
known.* Calculations in the framework of the ap-
proximation used in [14] for higher energies are mere-
ly tentative and they give a considerable quantative
discrepancy with the experiments.
The causes for this are the following: because of p o o r
information about e-nucleon interactions some chan-
nels of e - N reaction accompanied by pion produc-
tion were not taken into account; channels of e-parti-
cle fragmentation in deuterons were neglected; the
exitation energy of residual nucleus was negative
sometimes because of insufficiently precise cinemati-
cal approximations in the channels of t and 3He-
fragments production.
Our purpose is to expand the model of [14] to the
energy region T~ ~ f e w GeV per nucleon and to ana-
lize the validity of the intranuclear cascade mecha-
nism for e-nucleus interactions in this energy do-
main.**
The target nucleus is considered as a Fermi-gas of
nucleons with density p (r) which is described for light
nuclei by the distribution of harmonic oscillator mo-
del and by Woods-Saxon distribution for nuclei heav-
* T~ is the energy of e-particle in the lab. system
** The investigation of pion and nucleon - nucleus interactions
results to necessity of further development of the model at the
energies T>20-30 GeV, at which one must consider time coordi-
nate during the cascade process more precisely and must take
into account the contributior~ of multiparticle interactions [17, 18]

0340-2193/80/0296/0371/$01.20
372 V.S. Barashencov et al. : Cascade Model of Inelastic Interactions

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I d "~ ~ h i I I n i i I n n L I I
0.2 115 1 2 5 l0
TN [.OeV.1 5 **
Fig. 1. The inclusive cross sections for a - N reaction in s.m. system
of a-particle. Curves a, b, c, d, f correspond to channels
a+p(n)--+a+..., 3He(t)+ .... t(~He)+ .... d + .... 4 N + . . . respec- ~
tively

9 i 9 9 I ~ ~
ier than carbon with the parameters obtained in the
0 0.2 0.4 0.6
electron scattering experiments. For every e-nucleus
P [c-eV/c]
collision the coordinates of all intranuclear nucleons
Fig. 2. The momentum distribution of nucleons inside of c~-particle.
are calculated by Monte-Carlo method and are stored The histogram represents the calculated results, the points are the
in the computer storage [19]. experimental ones from [5]
Initial e-particle can collide elastically or inelastically
with one of intranuclear nucleons inside of a cylinder
lated this way the momentum distribution of e-parti-
with an axis in the direction of e-particle motion cle nucleons is shown in Fig. 2. The angular distribu-
and with radius
tion of these nucleons is isotropic.
reff = r 0 +/'1 -k;~ Characteristics of secondaries produced in N - N - c o l -
lisions inside of moving e-particle are calculated with
here ro = 1.3.10- 13 cm - effective radius of the strong
taking into account charge, energy, and momentum
interaction, r 1 - parameter registering the radius of
conservation the same way, as for cascade particle
e-particle, Z-its de Brogle wave length.
interactions inside of the target nucleus (see, in detail
In order to determine elastic and inelastic e - N inter-
[20]). Momentum and angular characteristics of spec-
action cross sections o-~jand r we use the approxima-
tator fragments and nucleons are determined taking
tion curves of [20]; the probabilities of fragmenta-
tion channels e + N ~ e + .... 3 H e + . . . , t + .... d + . . . , into account conservation laws for e +N-system. One
p + . . . are determined by using experimental data of can have an idea about relative probabilities of chan-
[5, 21, 22] (see Fig. 1). nels of reaction e + N and the degree of fit of
As well as in the previous paper [14] we assume that our results to the experiment from Table 1, where,
inelastic e - N interactions carried out by means of as an example, the data for e-particle of energy
once-through N - N - c o l l i s i o n inside of e-particle. In T~ = 1.4 GeV per nucleon are shown.
Interactions of d, t, SHe-fragments are calculated in
every such collision one must take into account both
Fermi momentum for nucleon of the target nucleus analogy with e-nucleons interactions. Parameter r 1
P r and e-particle nucleon momentum P~. The module in the experiment for the radius of cylinder Feff is
of PT is calculated according to Fermi distribution determined by experimental radii of these nuclei. We
with limited momentum suppose that every inelastic collisions of these nuclei
with intranuclear nucleons lead to their break-up.
P ( r ) = c .p (r) ~/3 Other details of calculations (in particular, simulation
where r - coordinate of a nucleon, c - normalization of intranuclear ~ - N and N - N interactions) are the
coefficient [23]. Module P, is calculated according same, as those in papers [19, 20].
to distribution In order to compare the results of calculations we
W ( P ) ~,, p2 exp ( - p 2 / p g )
used the experimental data at the highest energy of
e-particle (T~ =3.64 GeV per nucleon) received up to
where P o = 1 4 0 MeV/c the parameter determined now. These data were obtained on the streamer
from the best fit to the experimental data [5].* Calcu- chamber set-up [7-9] and by using nuclear emulsion
technique [1~] with selection of information for light
* In [5] there was measured the momentum spectrum of 3He
in the reaction a + p ~ 3He + p +n. In Born approximation (specta-
(C, N, O) and heavy (Ag, Br) target nuclei.
tor model) this spectrum is the same as the momentum distribution Theoretical results were obtained using the same se-
of nucleons inside of a-particle (in its c.m.s) lection criteria as for the experiments.