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Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

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12 records
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
NASA NTRS1989

A study of pseudoresonances in the application of the Schwinger variational principle to electron scattering from atomic hydrogen

The Schwinger variational principle is applied to s-wave electron-hydrogen atom scattering. Computationally, consistent with a recent paper by Apagyi et al. (1988), there are pseudoresonances at the static exchange level of approximation, but not at the static level. The T-matrix as well as the K-matrix version of the Schwinger principle is used with a real Slater basis, and the same results are obtained in both. The origin of the pseudoresonances from singularities in the separable potential that is effectively employed in the Lippman-Schwinger equation from which the Schwinger variational principle can be derived. The determination of the pseudoresonance parameters from the separable potential is computationally inexpensive and may be used to predict the pseudoresonance parameters for the scattering calculations so as to avoid them.

Weatherford, Charles A.↗
NASA NTRS1989

The prediction of pseudo-resonance positions in the Schwinger variational principle

The Schwinger Variational Principle is appled to s-wave electron-hydrogen atom scattering. It is shown computationally, that, consistent with a paper by B. Apagyi, P. Levay, and K. Ladanyi, there are pseudo-resonances at the static exchange level of approximation, but not at the static level. The T-matrix was employed, as well as, the K-matrix version of the Schwinger Principle, with a real Slater basis, and obtained the same results in both. The origin of the pseudo-resonances as resulting from singularities in the separable potential that is effectively employed in the Lippmann-Schwinger equation from which the Schwinger Variational Principle can be derived. The determination of the pseudo-resonance parameters from the separable potential is computationally inexpensive and may be used to predict the pseudo-resonance parameters for the scattering calculations so that they may be avoided.

Weatherford, Charles A.↗
NASA NTRS1987

Correlation effects in elastic e-N2 scattering

The Schwinger multichannel formulation has been applied to study the role of electron correlation in low-energy e-N2 scattering. For the five nonresonant partial-wave channels studied here, angular correlation is found to be much more important than radial correlation. The calculated total and differential cross sections agree well with experiment except for the differential cross sections at 1.5 eV.

Huo, Winifred M.↗
NASA NTRS1999

Magnetic Photon Splitting: The S-Matrix Formulation in the Landau Representation

Calculations of reaction rates for the third-order QED process of photon splitting gamma yields gamma.gamma in strong magnetic fields traditionally have employed either the effective Lagrangian method or variants of Schwinger's proper-time technique. Recently, Mentzel, Berg and Wunner [1] presented an alternative derivation via an S-matrix formulation in the Landau representation. Advantages of such a formulation include the ability to compute rates near pair resonances above pair threshold. This paper presents new developments of the Landau representation formalism as applied to photon splitting, providing significant, advances beyond the work of [1] by summing over the spin quantum numbers of the electron propagators, and analytically integrating over the component of momentum of the intermediate states that is parallel to field. The ensuing tractable expressions for the scattering amplitudes are satisfyingly compact, and of an appearance familiar to S-matrix theory applications. Such developments can facilitate numerical computations of splitting considerably both below and above pair threshold. Specializations to two regimes of interest are obtained, namely the limit of highly supercritical fields and the domain where photon energies are far inferior to that for the threshold of single-photon pair creation. In particular, for the first time the low-frequency amplitudes are simply expressed in terms of the Gamma function, its integral and its derivatives. In addition, the equivalence of the asymptotic forms in these two domains to extant results from effective Lagrangian/proper- time formulations is demonstrated.

Baring, Matthew G.↗
NASA NTRS1987

Schwinger multichannel study of the 2Pi(g) shape resonance in N2

The results of a study on electron-target correlations in the 2Pi(g) shape resonance of elastic e-N2 scattering, using the Schwinger multichannel formulation, are reported. The effects of basis set, orbital representation, and closed-channel-configurations are delineated. The different roles of radial and angular correlations are compared.

Huo, Winifred M.↗
NASA NTRS1989

Polarization effects in low-energy e-CH4 collisions

Polarization effects on the cross sections for elastic scattering of electrons by the CH4 molecule, for collision energies from 7.5 down to 0.02 eV, are presently studied on the basis of Takatsuka and McKoy's (1981) Schwinger multichannel formulation. While the closed-channel expansion through which polarization effects are encompassed is not fully converged, the cross sections obtained nevertheless exhibit a Ramsauer-Townsend minimum in the 0.1-0.2 eV range; this is about 0.3 lower than the experimentally obtained value. At 7.5 eV, however, the calculated differential cross-sections are in excellent agreement with measured values.

Lima, M. A. P.↗
NASA NTRS1987

Effective propagation constants in dense random media under effective medium approximation

The effective medium approximation is applied to study the effective propagation constants in a dense random medium. The dyadic Green's function is introduced to establish the effective medium approximation formalism for electromagnetic waves. The multiple scattering equations and the Lippmann-Schwinger equations for the transition operator are obtained in the configuration average form. The dispersion equations of multiple scattering is derived by using a standard method in quantum mechanics. To obtain an expression for the effective propagation constants the matrix elements of the configuration average dyadic transiton operator are calculated in momentum representation. Numerical illustations are carried out to demonstrate the difference in the effective propagation constants between the use of this approximation and the well-known quasi-crystalline approximation. A comparison is made with measured loss tangent in dry snow.

Zhu, P. Y.↗
NASA NTRS1977

Infinite order sudden approximation for rotational energy transfer in gaseous mixtures

Rotational energy transfer in gaseous mixtures is analyzed within the framework of the infinite order sudden (IOS) approximation, and a new derivation of the IOS from the coupled states Lippman-Schwinger equation is presented. This approach shows the relation between the IOS and coupled state T matrices. The general IOS effective cross section can be factored into a finite sum of 'spectroscopic coefficients' and 'dynamical coefficients'. The evaluation of these coefficients is considered. Pressure broadening for the systems HD-He, HCl-He, CO-He, HCl-Ar, and CO2-Ar is calculated, and results based on the IOS approximation are compared with coupled state results. The IOS approximation is found to be very accurate whenever the rotor spacings are small compared to the kinetic energy, provided closed channels do not play too great a role.

Goldflam, R.↗
NASA NTRS1985

Studies of electron-polyatomic-molecule collisions Applications to e-CH4

The first application of the Schwinger multichannel formulation to low-energy electron collisions with a nonlinear polyatomic target is reported. Integral and differential cross sections are obtained for e-CH4 collisions from 3 to 20 eV at the static-plus-exchange interaction level. In these studies, the exchange potential is directly evaluated and not approximated by local models. An interesting feature of the small-angle differential cross section is ascribed to polarization effects and not reproduced at the static-plus-exchange level. These differential cross sections are found to be in reasonable agreement with existing measurements at 7.5 eV and higher energies.

Lima, M. A. P.↗
NASA NTRS2015

Nuclear Cross Sections for Space Radiation Applications

The eikonal, partial wave (PW) Lippmann-Schwinger, and three-dimensional Lippmann-Schwinger (LS3D) methods are compared for nuclear reactions that are relevant for space radiation applications. Numerical convergence of the eikonal method is readily achieved when exact formulas of the optical potential are used for light nuclei (A = 16) and the momentum-space optical potential is used for heavier nuclei. The PW solution method is known to be numerically unstable for systems that require a large number of partial waves, and, as a result, the LS3D method is employed. The effect of relativistic kinematics is studied with the PW and LS3D methods and is compared to eikonal results. It is recommended that the LS3D method be used for high energy nucleon-nucleus reactions and nucleus-nucleus reactions at all energies because of its rapid numerical convergence and stability for both non-relativistic and relativistic kinematics.

Werneth, C. M.↗
NASA NTRS2014

Elastic Differential Cross Sections

The eikonal, partial wave (PW) Lippmann-Schwinger, and three-dimensional Lippmann-Schwinger (LS3D) methods are compared for nuclear reactions that are relevant for space radiation applications. Numerical convergence of the eikonal method is readily achieved when exact formulas of the optical potential are used for light nuclei (A less than or equal to 16) and the momentum-space optical potential is used for heavier nuclei. The PW solution method is known to be numerically unstable for systems that require a large number of partial waves, and, as a result, the LS3D method is employed. The effect of relativistic kinematics is studied with the PW and LS3D methods and is compared to eikonal results. It is recommended that the LS3D method be used for high energy nucleon- nucleus reactions and nucleus-nucleus reactions at all energies because of its rapid numerical convergence and stability.

Werneth, Charles M.↗