Editing Elastic scattering (section)

{{Short description|Particle collisions conserving kinetic energy}}
{{More sources needed|date=December 2009}}

'''Elastic scattering''' is a form of particle [[scattering]] in [[scattering theory]], [[nuclear physics]] and [[particle physics]]. In this process, the internal states of the [[Elementary particle|particle]]s involved stay the same. In the non-relativistic case, where the relative velocities of the particles are much less than the [[speed of light]], elastic scattering simply means that the total [[kinetic energy]] of the system is conserved.<ref>“Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and transmission electron microscopy (TEM) for materials characterization,” B.J. Inkson, “Materials Characterization Using Nondestructive Evaluation (NDE) Methods,” 2016. https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/chemistry/elastic-scattering</ref> At relativistic velocities, elastic scattering also requires the final state to have the same number of particles as the initial state and for them to be of the same kind.<ref>{{cite book|title=Fields|author=Warren Siegel|author-link=Warren Siegel|pages=362|url=https://arxiv.org/abs/hep-th/9912205|year=1999|accessdate=2024-04-30}}</ref>