Elastic Scattering of 40-Mev Alpha Particles from Heavy Elements

Abstract

Angular distributions have been measured for the elastic scattering of 40-Mev alpha particles from Ta, Au, Pb, and Th in the angular range 21° to 155°. If the ratios of the measured cross sections to the Coulomb cross section are assumed equal to 1.0 at small angles, they increase slightly with increasing angle, and in the vicinity of 30° decrease exponentially with increasing angle to values less than 0.001. These data are compared with the semiclassical, strong absorption model of Blair and with the recent model of Ford and Wheeler.