  Using a density matrix approach to describe the process of coalescence, we
calculate the coalescence probabilities and invariant momentum spectra for
deuterons and antideuterons. We evaluate our expressions with a
hydrodynamically motivated parametrization for the source at freeze-out which
implements rapid collective expansion of the collision zone formed in heavy ion
collisions. We find that the coalescence process is governed by the same
lengths of homogeneity which can be extracted from HBT interferometry. They
appear in the absolute cluster yield via an effective volume factor as well as
in a quantum mechanical correction factor which accounts for the internal
structure of the deuteron cluster. Our analysis provides a new interpretation
for the parameters in the popular phenomenological coalescence model and for
the effective overlap volume in Hagedorn's model for cluster production in pp
collisions. Using source parameters extracted from a recent HBT analysis of
two-pion correlations, we successfully describe deuteron and antideuteron
production data from Pb+Pb collisions at the CERN SPS as measured by the NA44
and NA52 collaborations. We also confirm the recent finding by Polleri et al.
that the different measured slopes of nucleon and deuteron transverse mass
spectra require a transverse density profile of the source which is closer to a
box than to a Gaussian shape.
