Regge Oscillations in Integral Cross Sections for Proton Impact on Atomic Hydrogen

The integral cross sections for elastic scattering and spin exchange for proton impact on atomic hydrogen show several oscillations in the energy range 0.01–1.0  eV that cannot be associated with resonances or the glory effect. A complex angular momentum analysis using computed Regge trajectories shows that each peak of the oscillatory structure is predominantly associated with at most three trajectories. In this way, the peaks are related to the L=0 bound states of H₂⁺. The complex angular momentum theory for integral cross sections that we introduce shows that such oscillations are a general feature of potential scattering.