Medium effects in K+ nucleus interaction from consistent analysis of integral and differential cross sections

Self-consistency in the analysis of transmission measurements for K+ on several nuclei in the momentum range of 500–700 MeV/c is achieved with a ‘teff(ϱ)ϱ’ potential and new results are derived for total cross sections. The imaginary part of the teff amplitude is found to increase linearly with the average nuclear density in excess of a threshold value of 0.088±0.004 fm−3. This phenomenological density dependence of the K+ nuclear optical potential also gives rise to good agreement with recent measurements of differential cross sections for elastic scattering of 715 MeV/c K+ by 6Li and C.