Exploring Three Nucleon Forces with Nucleon–Deuteron Scattering Original Research Article

Recent progress on three nucleon force study with three nucleon scattering at intermediate energies (E/A≈100 MeV) is presented, especially focusing on the experimental work on deuteron–proton elastic scattering and breakup reactions at RIKEN. The first signature of three nucleon forces is identified in the cross section minimum for deuteron–proton elastic scattering by direct comparison between the precise data and state of the art Faddeev calculations based on the nucleon–nucleon forces plus the 2π–exchange three nucleon forces. However the polarization observables are not always properly described by adding the three nucleon forces, indicating that components other than 2π–exchange three nucleon forces are required to describe the data.