Scattering from non-overlapping potentials. I. General formulation

The problem of scattering from an assembly of non-overlapping spherical potentials is solved in partial-wave basis for each of the constituent potentials. The resulting scattering operator is a quotient of two infinite matrices and depends on "on-shell" partial wave amplitudes of the individual potentials. It suggests in general a truncation scheme which essentially considers only those partial waves effective for each collision at the given energy. The multiple-scattering series is recovered and limiting cases of low energy and high energy are considered. Applications to high-energy scattering of elementary particles on nuclei are briefly discussed.