Unified Picture of Proton-Proton Elastic Scattering at All Angles from 3 to 24 GeV/<i>c</i>

Abstract

We have investigated $\mathrm{pp}$ elastic scattering on the basis of smooth distributions for the helicity-nonflip and -flip amplitudes in the impact parameter $b$. We show how these distributions change with energy. We give interpretations for the shrinkage of the forward diffraction peak, the break in $\frac{d\ensuremath{\sigma}}{\mathrm{dt}}$ at $|t|\ensuremath{\approx}1$ ${(\mathrm{G}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{V}/\mathit{c})}^{2}$, and the observed pronounced structure in the $\mathrm{pp}$ polarization.