Calculation of electron scattering cross-section using different theoretical methods

Abstract

Aiming at the simulation of the fine process of the electron transportation in gamma detectors, we calculate electron differential scattering cross-section (DCS) of several typical materials including Fe, ethylene and polyethylene. Based on two different calculation methods, which are partial wave methods based on Dirac equation and R-matrix theory, we find differences of the cross section at low energy region. The result indicates that both partial wave method and R-matrix theory associated with independent atom method (IAM) are not suitable for low energy electron impacting on strong coupled molecule, for example, electron-ethylene. For high energy electron interacting with atom and molecule, the result shows no critical difference because the kinetic energy of the incident electron is severely higher than the electron bound energy in molecule or the excitation energy of a certain atom.