Investigations on compton scattering: New directions

Although inelastic (Compton) scattering of a photon off a free electron was well understood about 80 years ago, inelastic scattering off bound electrons remains an incompletely understood process. The availability of synchrotron light sources has led a great enhancement in the precision of experimental measurements involving this process. As a result, approximations made in obtaining numerical predictions of physical observables are being reexamined by theorists. In this article, we present a comparison of experimental measurements to theoretical predictions to assess the need for future advances in both experiment and theory.