Scattering of Polarized Electrons by Nuclei with Magnetic Moments

Abstract

The cross section and asymmetry function $S$ have been calculated in the static limit for the scattering of polarized electrons from a point target with charge and magnetic moment, in the first and second Born approximations. The asymmetry, which vanishes in first order for both polarized and unpolarized incident electrons and for aligned and randomly oriented target spin, is found to be nonvanishing in second order for the scattering of polarized electrons from randomly oriented spin targets. The calculated $S$ contains contributions from both charge and magnetic scattering. Previous results established that $S$ for Mott scattering has its maximum near 180° and that the position of this maximum approaches 180° as the incident electron energy increases. We discuss the possibility that these features can be used in conjunction with the results of the present calculation to obtain information about the magnetic structure of nuclei by measuring the deviation from the Mott scattering behavior of $S$ at backward angles where magnetic scattering is important. A precision measurement of $S$ appears to be necessary.