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Photoproduction of $eta$ mesons from neutrons} abstract{Results from measurements of the photoproduction of $eta$ mesons from quasifree protons and neutrons are summarized. The experiments were performed with the CBELSA/TAPS detector at the electron accelerator ELSA in Bonn using the $etato3pi^{0}to6gamma$ decay. A liquid deuterium target was used for the measurement of total cross sections and angular distributions. The results confirm earlier measurements from Bonn and the MAMI facility in Mainz about the existence of a narrow structure in the excitation function of $gamma nrightarrow neta$. The current angular distributions show a forward-backward asymmetry, which was previously not seen, but was predicted by model calculations including an additional narrow $P_{11}$ state. Furthermore, data obtained with a longitudinally polarized, deuterated butanol target and a circularly polarized photon beam were analyzed to determine the double polarization observable $E$. Both data sets together were also used to extract the helicity dependent cross sections $sigma_{1/2}$ and $sigma_{3/2}$. The narrow structure in the excitation function of $gamma nrightarrow neta$ appears associated with the helicity-1/2 component of the reaction.
Precise helicity-dependent cross sections and the double-polarization observable $E$ were measured for $eta$ photoproduction from quasi-free protons and neutrons bound in the deuteron. The $etarightarrow 2gamma$ and $etarightarrow 3pi^0rightarrow 6gamma$ decay modes were used to optimize the statistical quality of the data and to estimate systematic uncertainties. The measurement used the A2 detector setup at the tagged photon beam of the electron accelerator MAMI in Mainz. A longitudinally polarized deuterated butanol target was used in combination with a circularly polarized photon beam from bremsstrahlung of a longitudinally polarized electron beam. The reaction products were detected with the electromagnetic calorimeters Crystal Ball and TAPS, which covered 98% of the full solid angle. The results show that the narrow structure observed earlier in the unpolarized excitation function of $eta$ photoproduction off the neutron appears only in reactions with antiparallel photon and nucleon spin ($sigma_{1/2}$). It is absent for reactions with parallel spin orientation ($sigma_{3/2}$) and thus very probably related to partial waves with total spin 1/2. The behavior of the angular distributions of the helicity-dependent cross sections was analyzed by fitting them with Legendre polynomials. The results are in good agreement with a model from the Bonn-Gatchina group, which uses an interference of $P_{11}$ and $S_{11}$ partial waves to explain the narrow structure.
The double-polarization observable $E$ and the helicity-dependent cross sections $sigma_{1/2}$ and $sigma_{3/2}$ have been measured for the first time for single $pi^{0}$ photoproduction from protons and neutrons bound in the deuteron at the electron accelerator facility MAMI in Mainz, Germany. The experiment used a circularly polarized photon beam and a longitudinally polarized deuterated butanol target. The reaction products, recoil nucleons and decay photons from the $pi^0$ meson were detected with the Crystal Ball and TAPS electromagnetic calorimeters. Effects from nuclear Fermi motion were removed by a kinematic reconstruction of the $pi^{0}N$ final state. A comparison to data measured with a free proton target showed that the absolute scale of the cross sections is significantly modified by nuclear final-state interaction (FSI) effects. However, there is no significant effect on the asymmetry $E$ since the $sigma_{1/2}$ and $sigma_{3/2}$ components appear to be influenced in a similar way. Thus, the best approximation of the two helicity-dependent cross sections for the free neutron is obtained by combining the asymmetry $E$ measured with quasi-free neutrons and the unpolarized cross section corrected for FSI effects under the assumption that the FSI effects are similar for neutrons and protons.
Quasi-free photoproduction of eta-mesons off nucleons bound in the deuteron has been measured with the CBELSA/TAPS detector for incident photon energies up to 2.5 GeV at the Bonn ELSA accelerator. The eta-mesons have been detected in coincidence with recoil protons and recoil neutrons, which allows a detailed comparison of the quasi-free n(gamma,eta)n and p(gamma,eta)p reactions. The excitation function for eta-production off the neutron shows a pronounced bump-like structure at W=1.68 GeV (E_g ~ 1 GeV), which is absent for the proton.
The photoproduction of $eta^{}$-mesons from different nuclei has been measured using the Crystal Barrel(CB)/TAPS detector system at the ELSA accelerator facility in Bonn. Recent results on the in-medium properties of the $eta^{}$-meson, derived from the transparency ratio measurements, are presented. The absorption of the $eta^{}$-meson in nuclear matter is compared to the properties of the other mesons ($eta$ and $omega$).
The double polarization observable $E$ and the helicity dependent cross sections $sigma_{1/2}$ and $sigma_{3/2}$ were measured for $eta$ photoproduction from quasi-free protons and neutrons. The circularly polarized tagged photon beam of the A2 experiment at the Mainz MAMI accelerator was used in combination with a longitudinally polarized deuterated butanol target. The almost $4pi$ detector setup of the Crystal Ball and TAPS is ideally suited to detect the recoil nucleons and the decay photons from $etarightarrow 2gamma$ and $etarightarrow 3pi^0$. The results show that the narrow structure previously observed in $eta$ photoproduction from the neutron is only apparent in $sigma_{1/2}$ and hence, most likely related to a spin-1/2 amplitude. Nucleon resonances that contribute to this partial wave in $eta$ production are only $N1/2^-$ ($S_{11}$) and $N1/2^+$ ($P_{11}$). Furthermore, the extracted Legendre coefficients of the angular distributions for $sigma_{1/2}$ are in good agreement with recent reaction model predictions assuming a narrow resonance in the $P_{11}$ wave as the origin of this structure.