Determination of low-energy proton polarization via the 6Li(P→, 3He)4 reaction

A proton polarimeter has been designed and calibrated over the energy range of 250 ⩽ Ep ⩽ 460 keV. The 6(Li(p→, 3He)4 reaction was chosen due to its relatively large analyzing power and cross section in this energy range. The absolute calibration of the polarimeter has been established by accelerating the beam to 6 MeV and determining the polarization independently using 4He(p→, p) scattering. In addition, angular distributions of the analyzing power were measured for Ep = 255, 321 and 456 keV. The existing data on the analyzing power of the 6Li(p→, 3He)4He reaction below Ep = 1 MeV is summarized.