Studies in Muon Capture by complex nuclei

Abstract

The thesis is devoted to the study of some problems in Muon Capture, like (i) Gamma Neutrino Angular Correlations; (ii) Recoil Nuclear Polarisation; (iii) Total Capture rates; and (iv) an investigation of (V + A) admixture in the muon capture Hamiltonian. The thesis consists of five parts; Part 1 deals with the theory of muon capture process and density matrix formalism which is employed in it. Part 2 deals with a systematic and detailed investigation of gamma-neutrino angular correlations in unpolarised and polarised muon capture with density matrix methods. Part 3 is devoted to the study of average recoil of muon capture by 12C incorporating the effects of excited states of 12B polarisation. A numerical value is obtained by comparing with experiment. Part 4 discusses about total capture rates in heavy nuclei, within the context of Salam-Strathdee idea of vanishing of Cabibbo angle at large magnetic fields. In absence of a clear indication of such large nuclear magnetic fields, the results of the present study show the importance of nucleon momentum dependent terms in the analysis of total capture rates. Part 5 deals about (V+A) admixture in muon capture by hydrogen motivated by the left-right symmetric gauge theory of electro-weak interactions, and obtain a lower limit for the mass of right handed gauge boson.