Persistence of the Polarization in a Fusion Process

¹ Institut de Physique Nucléaire, CNRS/IN2P3 & Université Paris XI 91406 Orsay, France
² Laboratoire de Physique des Gaz et des Plasmas, CNRS & Université Paris XI, 91405 Orsay, France

^a e-mail: didelez@ipno.in2p3.fr

Abstract

We propose an experiment to test the persistence of the polarization in a fusion process, using a petawatt laser hitting a polarized HD target. The polarized protons and deuterons heated in the plasma induced by the laser have a significant probability to fuse producing a ³He and a γ ray or a neutron in the final state. The angular distribution of the radiated γ rays and the change in the correponding total cross section are related to the polarization persistence, but the resulting signal turns out to be weak. By comparison, the neutrons are produced hadronically with a larger cross section and are much easier to detect experimentally. A significant reduction of the cross section by parallel polarization of the deuterons is reliably predicted by the theory. Therefore, it is expected that the corresponding signal on the neutron counting rate could be seen experimentally.