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FIZIKA B 18 (2009) 4, 195-206
 
QUANTUM THEORY OF NEUTRON MULTIPLE-SLIT DIFFRACTION
XIANG-YAO WUa, BAI-JUN ZHANGa, XIAO-JING LIUa,
CHUN-LI ZHANGa, BING LIUa,
YI-QING GUOb, YI-HENG WUa, YAN WANGa and
QING-CAI WANGa
aInstitute of Physics, Jilin Normal University,
Siping 136000, China
bInstitute of High Energy Physics, PO Box 918(3),Chinese Academy of
Sciences,
Beijing 100049, China
Received27 August 2008; Accepted 7
October 2009
Online 29 October 2009
We study neutron multiple-slit diffraction with a quantum mechanical
approach. For the double-slit diffraction, we obtain the following results: (1)
when the ratio (d+a)/a=n (n=1, 2, 3, ¼), orders n,
2n, 3n, ¼
are missing in the diffraction pattern. (2) When the ratio of (d+a)/a
¹ n (n=1, 2, 3,
¼), there isn't any missing order in the diffraction
pattern. For diffraction on N (N ³ 3) slits, we obtain the following results: (1) There are N-2
secondary maxima and N-1 minima between the two
principle maxima. (2) As the slit number N increases, the diffraction intensity
increases and the peak widths become narrower. (3) As the slit width increases,
the diffraction intensity increases and the pattern width becomes narrower. (4)
When the two-slit distance d increases, the number of principle maxima increases
and the pattern becomes narrower. (5) We find a new quantum effect that the slit
thickness c has a large effect to the multiple-slit diffraction pattern. We
think all predictions in this work can be tested by neutron multiple-slit
diffraction experiments.
PACS numbers: 03.75.Dg, 61.12.Bt
UDC 52-656, 539.125
Keywords: matter-wave, neutron multiple-slit diffraction
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