Exact Results for Chaotic Scattering and Experimental Validation

As scattering experiments are the key tool to obtain information on nuclei and other quantum systems, the foundations of scattering theory were laid already a long time ago. Compound nucleus scattering prompted the study of generic statistical features. In the Heidelberg approach, those are taken into account by assuming that the reaction zone is fully quantum chaotic. Later on, this approach turned out to be applicable to a large variety of systems on different scales, including classical wave systems. For a long time, the distribution of the off-diagonal scattering-matrix elements resisted analytical treatment. In two recent studies [ 1, 2], we fully solved this problem and we also carried out a comparison with data from microwave experiments. Some comment are made on our very recent results for the cross-section distributions.