
2
dσγX /dt(sthr, t = 0) at left-hand side of Eq. (2) is not a
directly measurable quantity, as it requires extrapolation
of the energy to the threshold and extrapolation of t from
the physical region (tmin < t < tmax) to the non-physical
point t = 0. Therefore, when the vector meson nucleon
scattering length is extracted from the differential cross-
section data, we can not only extrapolate the energy at
the threshold tthr, but also extrapolate t to t = 0.
In this work, the following exponential function was
used to fit the differential cross-section data of near-
threshold ωand φphotoproductions on deuterium target
or hydrogen target.
dσ
dt =Ae−bt,(3)
where A=dσ/dt|t=0 denotes the forward differential
cross-section and bdescribes the slope parameter. Com-
bining Eq. (2) and Eq. (3), we can obtain the forward
differential cross-section value dσ/dt|t=tthr and dσ/dt|t=0
and extract the vector meson-nucleon scattering length
|αXN |.
Great progress has been made in meson-proton scatter-
ing length measurements, but little is known about the
vector meson-neutron scattering length. As the vector
meson-proton scattering length has already been fixed
by the data of ω,φ J/ψ,ψ(2S) and ρ0vector meson
photoproductions near threshold in the previous analy-
ses [3, 5–8, 10], We want to try whether we can extract
the vector meson-neutron scattering length using the
deuterium target data that the neutron and the proton
are loosely bound. The differential cross-section data of
near-threshold ωand φphotoproductions on deuterium
target were used for this analysis, including the inco-
herent photoproduction of vector meson (ωand φvec-
tor mesons) [11, 12] where the neutron or the proton is
knocked out. The incoherent data of ωand φphoto-
productions for scattering length extraction are provided
by CBELSA/TAPS Collaboration and LEPS Collabora-
tion, respectively. In this work, we extract ωn,ωp and
φN scattering length from the differential cross-section
data of near-threshold ωand φphotoproductions on deu-
terium target, where the deuteron is usually approxi-
mated as a weakly bound state of a quasi-free neutron
plus a quasi-free proton. For comparison study, we also
extracted the scattering length |αωp|of the free proton
from the ωphotoproduction on the hydrogen target by
CBELSA/TAPS Collaboration.
II. ωn,ωp AND φN SCATTERING LENGTHS
FROM ωAND φDIFFERENTIAL
PHOTOPRODUCTION CROSS SECTIONS
A. ωn∗scattering length from ωdifferential
photoproduction cross sections on the deuterium
target
Figure 1 shows the differential cross sections of the ω
meson photoproductions produced off the bound neutron
0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8
)
2
-t (GeV
1
10
2
10
)
2
b/GeVµ/dt (σd
n(p)ω →d γCBELSA data: = 1.175 GeV]
γ
[Eω
= 1.215 GeV]
γ
/4 [Eω
= 1.240 GeV]
γ
/16 [Eω
FIG. 1. Differential cross sections of the near threshold pho-
toproduction of ωmeson produced off the quasi-free neutron
versus the momentum transfer -t in the deuterium target [11].
The three incident photon energies Eγ(1.175, 1.215 and 1.240
GeV) near the threshold of ωmesons produced off the quasi-
free neutron are marked in the figure. Some cross sections are
scaled using the coefficients shown in the figure.
as a function of momentum transfer −t, with three inci-
dent photon energies Eγ. This reaction with exactly four
neutral hits (ω→γγγ and neutron) of the experiment at
ELSA [11] is detected where the ωmeson was produced
off the bound neutron in the liquid deuterium target giv-
ing the quasi-free reaction γd→ωn(p). The differential
cross sections of the |t|-dependence are fitted with an ex-
ponential function. We determined the parameters A and
the b at three incident photon energies Eγ(1.175, 1.215
and 1.240 GeV) through fitting to the ωmesons pro-
duced off the bound neutron with deuterium target data
[11] with Eq. (3). Then the values of dσγn∗/dt(sthr , tthr )
and dσγn∗/dt(sthr,0) are calculated by fitting parame-
ters A and b obtained by fitting the |t|-dependent differ-
ential photoproduction cross-section data. The scatter-
ing length |αωn∗|at the threshold tthr and in t to t =
0 are then calculated by Eq. (2). The extracted scat-
tering length |αωn∗|are listed in Table I. The averaged
scattering length |αωn∗|for the three extracted values
at different Eγenergies at threshold is calculated to be
0.709 ±0.078 fm. The averaged scattering length |αωn∗|
for the three extracted values at different Eγenergies in t
to t = 0 is calculated to be 1.258 ±0.130 fm. Here we use
the following formula to calculate the weighted average:
x±δ x = Σiωixi/Σiωi±(Σiωi)−1/2with ωi= 1/(δxi)2
[13]. It is worth noting that the weighted average values
of scattering length at different energies obtained here
are consistent with the simultaneous fitting results of all
data sets.