Scattering of Protons by Deuterium from 1.0 to 2.0 BeV

The differential cross sections for proton-deuteron elastic scattering at high momentum transfers have been measured at incident proton kinetic energies from 1 to 2 BeV in a counter experiment. The differential cross sections for backward elastic scattering at incident kinetic energies of 1.0, 1.3, and 1.5 BeV have been measured for values of the cosine of the center-of-mass proton scattering angle (cosθ*) from -0.5 to -0.9, which corresponds to values of the four-momentum transfer squared (-t) from 2.6 to 5.0 (BeV/c)². A backward peak is observed, and the cross section decreases rapidly with increasing energy. At 2.0 BeV, the forward elastic differential cross section has been measured for -t from 0.44 to 1.54 (BeV/c)², or cosθ* from 0.875 to 0.565. A shoulderlike departure from the forward diffraction peak is observed.