Paper detail

Dineutron and the three-nucleon continuum observables

We investigate how strong a hypothetical 1S0 bound state of two neutrons would affect different observables in the neutron-deuteron reactions. To that aim we extend our momentum space scheme of solving three-nucleon Faddeev equations to incorporate in addition to the deuteron also the 1S0 dineutron bound state. We discuss effects induced by dineutron on the angular distribution of the neutron-deuteron elastic scattering and cross sections of the deuteron breakup. A comparison to the available data for neutron-deuteron total cross sections and elastic scattering angular distributions cannot decisively exclude a possibility that the two neutrons can form 1S0 bound state. However, the strong modifications of a final-state-interaction peak of the neutron-deuteron breakup when changing from negative to positive values of the neutron-neutron scattering length seems to exclude existence of dineutron.