Measurements ofπ−p forward elastic scattering at high energies

Abstract The differential cross section of π − p scattering has been measured in the energy region 100–345 GeV and in the t -range 0.002 t | c ) 2 . The real part of the π − p scattering amplitude has been extracted from the data. The results show that the real part continues to increase with energy. The energy dependence of the slope parameter has also been determined. The shrinkage found expressed in terms of the slope of the pomeron trajectory is2 α ′ p =0.23±0.04 (GeV/ c ) −2 . This agrees with the energy dependence found at larger| t |-values.