Kaon–Nucleon Interaction Studied by Kaonic X Rays with DEAR at DAΦNE

Abstract

The scientific program and the experimental setup of the DEAR (DAΦNE Exotic Atom Research) experiment on the new ϕ-factory DAΦNE of Laboratori Nazionali di Frascati, are presented. The objective of DEAR is to perform a 1% measurement of the shift, due to the strong interaction, of the K_α line of kaonic hydrogen and a similar precision measurement, performed for the first time, on kaonic deuterium. The aim is to investigate the low-energy KN physics and to understand SU(3) chiral symmetry breaking. DEAR looks as the major effort ever performed to study low energy KN interaction, capable to produce a real breakthrough in the field.