Measurement of 3,4He( <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" altimg="si40.svg"> <mml:mrow> <mml:msup> <mml:mi>K</mml:mi> <mml:mo>−</mml:mo> </mml:msup> <mml:mo>,</mml:mo> <mml:msup> <mml:mi>π</mml:mi> <mml:mn>0</mml:mn> </mml:msup>
Light $s$-shell hypernuclei ($^{3,4}_Λ\text{H}$) and their ground-state properties are crucial benchmarks in hypernuclear physics. In particular, comparing the production cross sections of $^{3}_Λ\text{H}$ and $^{4}_Λ\text{H}$ provides insights into the $ΛN$ interaction in different isospin configurations, which can help address recent discrepancies in the reported $Λ$ binding energy of hypertriton. We present the first measurement of the production cross sections for $^{3}_Λ\text{H}$ and $^{4}_Λ\text{H}$ using the in-flight $(K^-, π^0)$ reaction at a beam momentum of 1.0 GeV/$c$ with an identical experimental setup. The production cross sections in the laboratory frame, for the angular range from 0$^{\circ}$ to 20$^{\circ}$, are measured to be $15.0~\pm~2.6~(\text{stat.})~^{+2.4}_{-2.8}~(\text{syst.})~μ\text{b} $ and $49.9~\pm~2.1~(\text{stat.})~^{+7.8}_{-8.0}~(\text{syst.})~μ\text{b}$ for the ground-state of $^{3}_Λ\text{H}$ and $^{4}_Λ\text{H}$, respectively. Using the ratio of these cross sections and comparing it with theoretical calculations, we evaluate the $Λ$ binding energy of hypertriton, yielding a value consistent with the picture of a loosely bound system.
Authors
- T. Yamaga
- X. Q. Yuan (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9346-5645)
- Catalina Curceanu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1990-0127)
- Hiroaki Ohnishi (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9427-1984)
- F. Sakuma (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2490-0508)
- K. Itahashi
- A. Clozza (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2133-1725)
- Florin Sirghi
- M. Iliescu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9648-3451)
- X. Chen
- A. Scordo (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7703-7050)
- H. Outa
- Masaki Sato (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5203-6388)
- M. Iwasaki (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3460-9469)
- S. Ishimoto
- Chunyang Han (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6565-9007)
- T. Hashimoto (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5325-4504)
- P. Zhang
- K. Shirotori
- T. Toda
- S. Suzuki
- R. Del Grande (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7599-2716)
- K. Tanida (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8255-3746)
- R. Murayama (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4336-3261)
- Kentaro Inoue (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7447-5856)
- Akira Sakaguchi (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5316-8750)
- Yong‐Wei Zhang (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7255-1678)
- Heyun Zhang (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8301-806X)
- K. Piscicchia (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6879-452X)
- Y. Ma (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0004-4837-579X)
- H. Asano
- H. Noumi
- D. Sirghi
- S Okada
- Takaya Akaishi (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1469-4563)
Publication Details
- Journal
- Physics Letters B
- Published
- 2026-01-13
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1016/j.physletb.2026.140163
- Citations
- 1
- Primary Topic
- Advanced NMR Techniques and Applications
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 16.26