The measurement of the pion-nucleon scattering lengths constitutes a high-precision test of the methods of Chiral Pertubation Theory, which is the low-energy approach of QCD. The pion-nucleon s-wave scattering lengths are related to the strong-interaction shift and width of the s-states of the pionic hydrogen atom. Shift and width are determined from the measured energies and line widths of X-ray transitions to the 1s ground state when compared to the calculated electromagnetic values. A new experiment, set up at the Paul-Scherrer-Institut, has completed a first series of measurements.
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