Influence of the d-state component of the deuteron wave function on the application of the Trojan horse method

The Trojan horse method allows one to extract the cross section of a binary reaction by properly selecting the quasi-free component of a suitable surrogate reaction. A crucial point of its application is the discrimination of the quasi-free contribution to the total reaction yield, requiring the study of the experimental momentum distribution of the adopted Trojan horse nucleus. Deuteron has been largely used as Trojan horse nucleus in p- and n-induced reactions and the extracted experimental momentum distribution compared with the square of the Hulthen wave function in momentum space, which accounts for the s-wave component of the deuteron wave function. Here, the contribution of the d-wave has been evaluated, turning out to be negligibly small, thus corroborating the assumptions made so far in Trojan horse experiments where deuteron has been used.