Diffraction Enhancement of the Stern—Gerlach Effect for a Neutron in a Crystal

• Published in: JETP letters Vol. 110; no. 9; pp. 581 - 584
• Main Authors: Voronin, V. V., Semenikhin, S. Yu, Shapiro, D. D., Braginetz, Yu. P., Fedorov, V. V., Nesvizhevsky, V. V., Jentschel, M., Ioffe, A., Berdnikov, Ya. A.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Moscow Pleiades Publishing 01.11.2019; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Atomic; Biological and Medical Physics; Biophysics; Crystals; Diffraction; Fields; Molecular; Neutron beams; Neutrons; Nuclei; Optical and Plasma Physics; Particle and Nuclear Physics; Particles; Physics; Physics and Astronomy; Quantum Information Technology; Solid State Physics; Spintronics; Splitting
• ISSN: 0021-3640; 1090-6487
• DOI: 10.1134/S0021364019210124

The spatial splitting of an unpolarized neutron beam into two spin components in an inhomogeneous magnetic field (an analog of the Stern-Gerlach experiment) with small gradients has been measured at the Laue diffraction in a crystal and Bragg angles θ B = (78–82)° close to a right one. The spatial splitting of the beam at a path length of 21.8 cm has reached (4.1 ± 0.1) cm (at a maximum gradient of 1.5 G/cm and a diffraction angle of 82°). In the absence of the crystal, the splitting would be ∼ 3.8 × 10 −7 cm at the same distance and gradient. The experimental enhancement coefficient is ∼ 10 5 tan 2 θ B , which is consistent with the theory.