Resonance Scattering Of Lyman Alpha Radiation By Hydrogen In The Ground State

Consideration is given to the problem of the scattering of a photon by hydrogen in the ground state when the photon has its principal frequencies near that of Lyman-alpha radiation. The scattering operator and cross-section is obtained for this process. The procedure is to adapt Dirac's theory of resonance scattering to the problem and, by quantizing the electromagnetic field in an angular momentum basis, to solve the problem exactly within the framework of the Dirac theory. The total scattering cross-section at resonance is found to be 7.062 x 10 to the -12th power sq. cm. The natural half width of the scattered line is 0.000103 A. The resonance frequency itself is shifted toward the long wave length side by 4281 mc/sec. The shift in the resonance from the original Lyman-alpha frequency can be interpreted as an indication that the Dirac resonance scattering theory contains a large part of the Lamb shift of the ground state. This fact suggests new ways of obtaining the Lamb shift for various levels which will be explored later. (Author).

Proceedings of the IAU Symposium No. 40, held in Marfa, Texas, U.S.A., October 26-31, 1969