Proton elastic scattering from tin isotopes at 295 MeV and systematic change of neutron density distributions

Understand

Cross sections and analyzing powers for proton elastic scattering from $^{116,118,120,122,124}$Sn at 295 MeV have been measured for a momentum transfer of up to about 3.5 fm$^{-1}$ to deduce systematic changes of the neutron density distribution.

• We tuned the relativistic Love-Franey interaction to explain the proton elastic scattering of a nucleus whose density distribution is well known.
• Then, we applied this interaction to deduce the neutron density distributions of tin isotopes.
• The result of our analysis shows the clear systematic behavior of a gradual increase in the neutron skin thickness of tin isotopes with mass number.