ABSTRACT
We begin this chapter with a general discussion of the scattering process. To understand the laws governing the interactions of elementary particles, the most popular experiment technique is to scatter a variety of particles by a variety of targets. On the other hand, atoms and molecular structure are largely explored using spectroscopic methods. We can argue that, in some sense, spectroscopy is another form of scattering. The atom in the ground state is excited by some projectile, and then an outgoing photon is observed with the atom going into the ground state again, or possibly another excited state.
