Quantum entanglement and neutron scattering experiments

It is shown that quantum entanglement in condensed matter can be observed with scattering experiments if the energy resolution of the experiments enables a clear separation between the elastic scattering and the scattering from the excitations in the system. These conditions are not satisfied in recent deep inelastic neutron scattering experiments from hydrogen-containing systems that have been interpreted as showing the existence of quantum entanglement for short times in, for example, water at room temperature. It is shown that the theory put forward to explain these experiments is inconsistent with the first-moment sum rule for the Van Hove scattering function and we suggest that the theory is incorrect. The experiments were performed using the unique EVS spectrometer at ISIS and suggestions are made about how the data and their interpretation should be re-examined.