Nucleon-nucleon scattering in a harmonic potential

The discrete energy eigenvalues of two nucleons interacting with a finite-range nuclear force and confined to a harmonic potential are used to numerically reconstruct the free-space scattering phase shifts. The extracted phase shifts are compared to those obtained from the exact continuum scattering solution and agree within the uncertainties of the calculations. Our results suggest that it might be possible to determine the amplitudes for the scattering of complex systems, such as nd, nt, or n alpha, from the energy eigenvalues confined to finite volumes using ab initio bound-state techniques.