Eur. Phys. J. D (2012) 66: 6
https://doi.org/10.1140/epjd/e2011-20298-5

Regular Article

Scattering length for Lennard-Jones potentials

Departamento de Física Teórica, Universidad de Zaragoza, 5009 Zaragoza, Spain

^a e-mail: javier@unizar.es

Received: 20 May 2011
Received in final form: 24 October 2011
Published online: 11 January 2012

Abstract

We present an exact procedure that allows one to calculate the scattering length for any potential expressed as an algebraic sum of inverse powers of the inter-atomic distance. We apply it to (12,s) Lennard-Jones potentials, with different values of s. The procedure is suitable for a very precise determination of the intensities of the potential corresponding to zeros or poles of the scattering length.