Electromagnetic structure of trinucleons

The electromagnetic form factors of the trinucleons H-3 and He-3 are calculated with wave functions obtained with the Argonne vis two-nucleon and Urbana IX three-nucleon interactions. Full account is taken of the two-body currents required by current conservation with the upsilon(18) interaction as well as those associated with Na transition currents and the currents of Delta resonance components in the wave functions. Explicit three-nucleon current operators associated with the two-pion exchange three-nucleon interaction arising from irreducible S-wave pion-nucleon scattering are constructed and shown to have very little effect on the calculated magnetic form factors. The calculated magnetic form factor of H-3, and charge form factors of both H-3 and He-3 are in satisfactory agreement with the experimental data. However, the position of the zero in the magnetic form factor of He-3 is slightly underpredicted. [S0556-2813(98)06312-2]