Neutron-proton elastic diffusion study at low transfer between 400-1000 MeV

This thesis presents the first complete results of forward differential cross-section, over the entire range of the intermediate energies, in the neutron-proton system. The neutron beam is produced with the synchrotron Saturne II, using the reaction of deuteron break-up, which gives it a relatively high intensity and a small energy dispersion. The experimental apparatus is a drift ionization chamber, IKAR, filled with high pressure gas which plays the double role of target and detector of the recoil proton. The use of a neutral beam requires new procedures in the analysis, more elaborate than in the case of charged projectiles, where scattered particles were detected in coincidence in wire chambers. The results are then normalized and discussed, using a phenomenological parametrization, and integrated in a continuously energy-dependent phase-shifts analysis. An entirely analytic Glauber calculation allows us to estimate the validity of the normalization method