ηd scattering in the region of the S₁₁ resonance

We have studied the reaction ηd → ηd close to threshold within a nonrelativistic three-body formalism. We considered several ηN and NN models, in particular potentials with separable form, fitted to the low-energy ηN and NN data to represent the two-body interactions. We found that with realistic two-body interactions a quasibound state does not exist in this system, although there is an enhancement of the cross section by one order of magnitude, in the region near threshold, which is a genuine three-body effect not predicted within the impulse approximation.