With the aim at quantitatively investigating the longstanding problem concerning the effect of short range nucleon-nucleon correlations on scattering processes at high energies, the total neutron-nucleus cross section is calculated within a parameter
-free approach which, for the first time, takes into account, simultaneously, central, spin, isospin and tensor nucleon-nucleon (NN) correlations, and Glauber elastic and Gribov inelastic shadowing corrections. Nuclei ranging from 4He to 208Pb and incident neutron momenta in the range 3 GeV/c - 300 GeV/c are considered; the commonly used approach which approximates the square of the nuclear wave function by a product of one-body densities is carefully analyzed, showing that NN correlations can play a non-negligible role in high energy scattering off nuclei.
The total neutron-Nucleus cross section has been calculated within an approach which takes into account nucleon-nucleon correlations, Glauber multiple scattering and inelastic shadowing corrections. Nuclear targets ranging from 4He to 208Pb and neutr
on incident momentum ranging from 3 to 300 GeV/c, have been considered. Correlations have been introduced by two different approaches leading to the same results. The commonly used approximation, consisting in treating nuclear effects only by a product of one-body densities, is carefully analyzed and it is shown that the effects of realistic correlations resulting from modern nucleon-nucleon interactions and realistic correlations resulting from realistic nucleon-nucleon interactions and microscopic ground state calculation of nuclear properties cannot be disregarded.
