Dispersion Contribution to High-Energy Electron-Deuteron Scattering

Abstract

An attempt is made to estimate the contribution of the intermediate nuclear virtual states to the high-energy electron elastic scattering cross section in the special case of the deuteron. A method is developed by which the nuclear excited states can be approximated by suitably modified free-nucleon wave functions in the sum over intermediate states. Expressions for the contribution to the cross section arising from the cross terms between the first- (in $e^2$) and second-order terms of the scattering amplitude are obtained and some numerical results are presented. Some disagreement with previous assumptions as to the magnitude of the "true" dispersion correction is indicated.