Complete analysis of pion-nucleon scattering in chiral perturbation theory to third order

We consider pion-nucleon scattering in heavy-baryon chiral perturbation theory to third order. All electromagnetic corrections appearing to this order are included. We thus have a consistent description of strong and electromagnetic effects, which allows us to isolate the strong part of the interaction in an unambiguous way. We give pion-nucleon phase shifts up to pion laboratory momenta of 100 MeV and find sizeable differences for the S-waves of the elastic channels compared to previous phase shift analyses. The precise description of the scattering process also allows us to address the question of isospin violation in the strong interaction. For the usually employed triangle relation we find an isospin breaking effect of -0.7% in the S-wave, whereas the P-waves show an effect of -1.5% and -4 to -2.5%, respectively, for pion laboratory momenta between 25 and 100 MeV.Comment: 17 pp, 7 fig

Pion-nucleon scattering in chiral perturbation theory II: Fourth order calculation

We analyse elastic-pion nucleon scattering to fourth order in heavy baryon chiral perturbation theory, extending the third order study published in Nucl. Phys. A640 (1998) 199. We use various partial wave analyses to pin down the low-energy constants from data in the physical region. The S-wave scattering lengths are consistent with recent determinations from pionic hydrogen and deuterium. We find an improved description of the P-waves. We also discuss the pion-nucleon sigma term and problems related to the prediction of the subthreshold parameters.Comment: 28 pp, LaTeX2e, uses epsf, 6 figs, better discussion of the convergence issues, accepted for publication in Nuclear Physics

Pion-nucleon scattering in an effective chiral field theory with explicit spin-3/2 fields

We analyze elastic-pion nucleon scattering to third order in the so-called small scale expansion. It is based on an effective Lagrangian including pions, nucleons and deltas as active degrees of freedom and counting external momenta, the pion mass and the nucleon-delta mass splitting as small parameters. The fermion fields are considered as very heavy. We present results for phase shifts, threshold parameters and the sigma term. We discuss the convergence of the approach. A detailed comparison with results obtained in heavy baryon chiral perturbation theory to third and fourth order is also given.Comment: 44 pp, LaTeX2e, uses epsf, 6 fig

The chiral effective pion-nucleon Lagrangian of order p^4

We construct the minimal effective chiral pion-nucleon SU(2) Lagrangian at fourth order in the chiral expansion. The Lagrangian contains 118 in principle measurable terms. We develop both the relativistic as well as the heavy baryon formulation of the effective field theory. For the latter, we also work out explicitly all 1/m corrections at fourth order. We display all relevant relations needed to find the linearly independent terms.Comment: 30 pp, LaTeX2e, coefficients of three third order 1/m^2 corrections proportional to F_{\mu\nu}^+ corrected in eq.(3.8) and table

On the size of isospin violation in low-energy pion-nucleon scattering

We present an analysis of isospin-breaking effects in threshold pion-nucleon scattering due to the light quark mass difference and the dominant virtual photon effects. We discuss the deviation from various relations, which are exact in the isospin limit. The size of the isospin-violating effects in the relations involving the isovector $\pi N$ amplitudes is typically of the order of one percent. We also find a new remarkably large effect $(\sim 40$ in an isoscalar triangle relation connecting the charged and neutral pion scattering off protons.Comment: 10 pp, LaTeX, uses epsf, 2 fig

Towards an understanding of isospin violation in pion-nucleon scattering

We investigate isospin breaking in low-energy pion-nucleon scattering in the framework of chiral perturbation theory. This work extends the systematic analysis of [1] to the energy range above threshold. Various relations, which identically vanish in the limit of isospin symmetry, are used to quantify isospin breaking effects. We study the energy dependence of the S- and P-wave projections of these ratios and find dramatic effects in the S-waves of those two relations which are given in terms of isoscalar quantities only. This effect drops rather quickly with growing center-of-mass energy.Comment: 12 pp, REVTeX, 8 figs, FZJ-IKP(TH)-2000-2

One-loop analysis of the reaction pi N to pi pi N

Single pion production off nucleons is studied in the framework of heavy baryon chiral perturbation theory to third order in the chiral expansion. Using total and some older differential cross section data to pin down the low-energy constants, most of the recent differential cross sections and angular correlation functions can be described as well as total cross sections at higher energies. We show that the contributions from the one loop graphs are essentially negligible and that the dominant terms at second and third order are related to pion-nucleon scattering graphs with one pion added. We also discuss the possibility of extracting the pion-pion S-wave scattering lengths from the unpolarized data.Comment: 57 pp, LaTeX file, 13 figures (uses epsf

Pion-nucleon scattering in chiral perturbation theory I: Isospin-symmetric case

We construct the complete effective chiral pion-nucleon Lagrangian to third order in small momenta based on relativistic chiral perturbation theory. We then perform the so-called heavy baryon limit and construct all terms up-to-and-including order $1/m^2$ with fixed and free coefficients. As an application, we discuss in detail pion-nucleon scattering. In particular, we show that the $1/m$ expansion of the Born graphs calculated relativistically can be recovered exactly in the heavy baryon approach without any additional momentum-dependent wave function renormalization. We fit various empirical phase shifts for pion laboratory momenta between 50 and 100 MeV. This leads to a satisfactory description of the phase shifts up to momenta of about 200 MeV. We also predict the threshold parameters, which turn out to be in good agreement with the dispersive analysis. In particular, we can sharpen the prediction for the isovector S-wave scattering length, $0.083 M_\pi^{-1} \leq a_{0+}^- \leq 0.093 M_\pi^{-1}$. We also consider the subthreshold parameters and give a short comparison to other calculations of $\pi N$ scattering in chiral perturbation theory or modifications thereof.Comment: 38 pp, LaTeX, uses epsf, 7 figs, additional remarks, one figure added, version to be published in Nucl.Phys.

Pion-nucleon physics in chiral pertubation theory

In the present work, we study pion-nucleon physics in chiral perturbation theory.We show how to construct the most general effective Lagrangian including nucleons,pions, and external sources. The theoretical framework once set, we proceed to thedescription of physical processes. Elastic pion-nucleon scattering is shown to be describedto high accuracy in the limit of isospin symmetry. We construct the chiralamplitude to full one-loop order and discuss the convergence of the chiral series. Weexplicitly add the delta resonance to the theory, thus making a detailed comparisonbetween the chiral expansion and the so-called small-scale expansion possible. Theinclusion of isospin breaking effects into the theory allows us to quantify isospin symmetryviolation in elastic pion-nucleon scattering reactions. As a second applicationwe study single-pion production off nucleons. We particularly focus on questionsrelated to convergence, and show that the contributions from chiral loops are fairlysmall