Abstract :
We present a new chiral expansion scheme for the nucleon–nucleon scattering amplitude which preserves unitarity exactly. Our effective field theory builds on the power counting rules for 2-nucleon reducible diagrams. We evaluate the leading order terms of the isospin one scattering amplitude and elaborate in detail on the 1S0 phase shift. Our chiral description of the 1S0-phase shift does compete in quality with modern phenomenological nucleon–nucleon potentials. We describe elastic and inelastic scattering quantitatively up to laboratory energies of Elab≃600 MeV.
