DIRAC Experiment at CERN: Lifetime Measurement of Pionium

Abstract

The DIRAC experiment, a magnetic double arm spectrometer, aims to measure the ${\pi }^{+}{\pi }^{-}$ atom lifetime with 10% precision, using the high intensity 24 GeV/c proton beam of the CERN Proton Synchrotron. Since the value of this lifetime of order $10^{-15}$~s is dictated by strong interaction at low energy, a precise measurement of this quantity enables to study characteristic pion parameters in detail and to submit predictions of QCD to a severe check.

Comments: 5 pages, 2 figures (eps and ps), conference, use dubna98.sty