{"title":"Diffraction-grating neutron interferometers","authors":"A.I. Ioffe","doi":"10.1016/0378-4363(88)90144-1","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>Aberration distortions of wavefronts in a very cold neutron interferometer using diffraction gratings are analyzed. Aberrations that considerably reduce the efficiency of a two-grating interferometer are shown to be fully compensable by adding a third diffraction grating, which also permits the interferometer to operate with a non-collimated and non-monochromatized illuminating beam thereby raising its efficiency. A fourth diffraction grating additionally permits compensation of effects of the terrestrial rotation that affect performance of a large interferometer in which the spatial separation of beams can be of the order of a few meters.</p><p>It is demonstrated to be practically possible to implement an interferometer for neutrons having a wavelength <em>λ</em> = 20 Å and to use it in experiments aimed at finding the electric charge of the neutron at the level of 10<sup>−23</sup> to 10<sup>−22</sup> of the electronic charge.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":101023,"journal":{"name":"Physica B+C","volume":"151 1","pages":"Pages 50-56"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0000,"publicationDate":"1988-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1016/0378-4363(88)90144-1","citationCount":"2","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Physica B+C","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/0378436388901441","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"","JCRName":"","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 2
Abstract
Aberration distortions of wavefronts in a very cold neutron interferometer using diffraction gratings are analyzed. Aberrations that considerably reduce the efficiency of a two-grating interferometer are shown to be fully compensable by adding a third diffraction grating, which also permits the interferometer to operate with a non-collimated and non-monochromatized illuminating beam thereby raising its efficiency. A fourth diffraction grating additionally permits compensation of effects of the terrestrial rotation that affect performance of a large interferometer in which the spatial separation of beams can be of the order of a few meters.
It is demonstrated to be practically possible to implement an interferometer for neutrons having a wavelength λ = 20 Å and to use it in experiments aimed at finding the electric charge of the neutron at the level of 10−23 to 10−22 of the electronic charge.