Analysis of the low-energy $\pi^- p$ charge-exchange data

We analyse the charge-exchange (CX) measurements $\pi^- p\rightarrow \pi^0 n$ below pion laboratory kinetic energy of 100 MeV. After the removal of five degrees of freedom from the initial database, we combine it with the truncated $\pi^+ p$ database of Ref. \cite{mrw1} and fit the ETH model \cite{glmbg} to the resulting data. The set of the parameter values of the ETH model, as well as the predictions derived on their basis for the hadronic phase shifts and for the low-energy $\pi N$ constants, are significantly different from the results obtained in the analysis of the truncated $\pi^\pm p$ elastic-scattering databases. The main difference in the hadronic phase shifts occurs in $\tilde{\delta}_{0+}^{1/2}$. We discuss the implications of these findings in terms of the violation of the isospin invariance in the hadronic part of the $\pi N$ interaction. The effect observed amounts to the level of $7-8$ in the CX scattering amplitude below 70 MeV. The results and conclusions of this study agree well with those obtained in the mid 1990s, when the isospin invariance was first tested by using $\pi N$ experimental data, and disagree with the predictions obtained within the framework of the heavy-baryon Chiral-Perturbation Theory.