Study of Approximations for Electron?Atom Direct Reactions

The electron-hydrogen system is a true three-body system which provides an excellent test for theories of reactions in many-body systems that approximately involve only three-body degrees of freedom. The coupled-channels optical approximation reproduces experimental data in most cases within experimental error. The approximation may be extended to a larger space of coupled channels by various approximations which are tested with the example of 54·42 e V electron scattering on the Is, 2s and 2p space for hydrogen, extended by the addition of 3s and 3p channels. Channels outside this five-state space are treated by including the corresponding polarization potentials.