Eur. Phys. J. A (2008) 35: 47-55
https://doi.org/10.1140/epja/i2007-10531-2

Regular Article - Theoretical Physics

Dynamics of polarization buildup by spin filtering

School of Mathematics, Trinity College Dublin, Ireland

Received: 13 July 2007
Accepted: 29 January 2008
Published online: 22 February 2008

Abstract

There has been much recent research into polarizing an antiproton beam, instigated by the recent proposal from the PAX (Polarized Antiproton eXperiment) project at GSI Darmstadt. It plans to polarize an antiproton beam by repeated interaction with a polarized internal target in a storage ring. The method of polarization by spin filtering requires many of the beam particles to remain within the ring after scattering off the polarized internal target via electromagnetic and hadronic interactions. We present and solve sets of differential equations which describe the buildup of polarization by spin filtering in many different scenarios of interest to projects planning to produce high-intensity polarized beams. These scenarios are: 1) spin filtering of a fully stored beam; 2) spin filtering while the beam is being accumulated, i.e. unpolarized particles are continuously being fed into the beam; 3) the particle input rate is equal to the rate at which particles are being lost due to scattering beyond the ring acceptance angle, the beam intensity remaining constant; 4) increasing the initial polarization of a stored beam by spin filtering; 5) the input of particles into the beam is stopped after a certain amount of time, but spin filtering continues. The rate of depolarization of a stored polarized beam on passing through an electron cooler is also shown to be negligible.