We report the first longitudinal-transverse separation of the deeply virtual exclusive π^{0} electroproduction cross section off the neutron and coherent deuteron. The corresponding four structure ...functions dσ_{L}/dt, dσ_{T}/dt, dσ_{LT}/dt, and dσ_{TT}/dt are extracted as a function of the momentum transfer to the recoil system at Q^{2}=1.75 GeV^{2} and x_{B}=0.36. The ed→edπ^{0} cross sections are found compatible with the small values expected from theoretical models. The en→enπ^{0} cross sections show a dominance from the response to transversely polarized photons, and are in good agreement with calculations based on the transversity generalized parton distributions of the nucleon. By combining these results with previous measurements of π^{0} electroproduction off the proton, we present a flavor decomposition of the u and d quark contributions to the cross section.
The (2)H(e,e'p)n cross section at a momentum transfer of 3.5 (GeV/c)(2) was measured over a kinematical range that made it possible to study this reaction for a set of fixed missing momenta as a ...function of the neutron recoil angle θ(nq) and to extract missing momentum distributions for fixed values of θ(nq) up to 0.55 GeV/c. In the region of 35°≤θ(nq)≤45° recent calculations, which predict that final-state interactions are small, agree reasonably well with the experimental data. Therefore, these experimental reduced cross sections provide direct access to the high momentum component of the deuteron momentum distribution in exclusive deuteron electrodisintegration.
We present deeply virtual π0 electroproduction cross-section measurements at xB=0.36 and three different Q2 values ranging from 1.5 to 2 GeV2, obtained from Jefferson Lab Hall A experiment E07-007. ...The Rosenbluth technique is used to separate the longitudinal and transverse responses. Results demonstrate that the cross section is dominated by its transverse component and, thus, is far from the asymptotic limit predicted by perturbative quantum chromodynamics. Nonetheless, an indication of a nonzero longitudinal contribution is provided by the measured interference term σLT. Results are compared with several models based on the leading-twist approach of generalized parton distributions (GPDs). In particular, a fair agreement is obtained with models in which the scattering amplitude includes convolution terms of chiral-odd (transversity) GPDs of the nucleon with the twist-3 pion distribution amplitude. This experiment, together with previous extensive unseparated measurements, provides strong support to the exciting idea that transversity GPDs can be accessed via neutral pion electroproduction in the high-Q2 regime.
We report on parity-violating asymmetries in the nucleon resonance region measured using inclusive inelastic scattering of 5-6 GeV longitudinally polarized electrons off an unpolarized deuterium ...target. These results are the first parity-violating asymmetry data in the resonance region beyond the Δ(1232). They provide a verification of quark-hadron duality-the equivalence of the quark- and hadron-based pictures of the nucleon-at the (10-15)% level in this electroweak observable, which is dominated by contributions from the nucleon electroweak γZ interference structure functions. In addition, the results provide constraints on nucleon resonance models relevant for calculating background corrections to elastic parity-violating electron scattering measurements.
We report on measurements of the neutron spin asymmetries A{sub 1,2}{sup n} and polarized structure functions g{sub 1,2}{sup n} at three kinematics in the deep inelastic region, with x=0.33, 0.47, ...and 0.60 and Q{sup 2}=2.7, 3.5, and 4.8 (GeV/c){sup 2}, respectively. These measurements were performed using a 5.7 GeV longitudinally polarized electron beam and a polarized {sup 3}He target. The results for A{sub 1}{sup n} and g{sub 1}{sup n} at x=0.33 are consistent with previous world data and, at the two higher-x points, have improved the precision of the world data by about an order of magnitude. The new A{sub 1}{sup n} data show a zero crossing around x=0.47 and the value at x=0.60 is significantly positive. These results agree with a next-to-leading-order QCD analysis of previous world data. The trend of data at high x agrees with constituent quark model predictions but disagrees with that from leading-order perturbative QCD (PQCD) assuming hadron helicity conservation. Results for A{sub 2}{sup n} and g{sub 2}{sup n} have a precision comparable to the best world data in this kinematic region. Combined with previous world data, the moment d{sub 2}{sup n} was evaluated and the new result has improved the precision of this quantity by about a factor of 2. When combined with the world proton data, polarized quark distribution functions were extracted from the new g{sub 1}{sup n}/F{sub 1}{sup n} values based on the quark-parton model. While results for {delta}u/u agree well with predictions from various models, results for {delta}d/d disagree with the leading-order PQCD prediction when hadron helicity conservation is imposed.
The {sup 2}H(e,e{sup '}p)n cross section at a momentum transfer of 3.5 (GeV/c){sup 2} was measured over a kinematical range that made it possible to study this reaction for a set of fixed missing ...momenta as a function of the neutron recoil angle {theta}{sub nq} and to extract missing momentum distributions for fixed values of {theta}{sub nq} up to 0.55 GeV/c. In the region of 35 deg. {<=}{theta}{sub nq}{<=}45 deg. recent calculations, which predict that final-state interactions are small, agree reasonably well with the experimental data. Therefore, these experimental reduced cross sections provide direct access to the high momentum component of the deuteron momentum distribution in exclusive deuteron electrodisintegration.
The three-dimensional structure of nucleons (protons and neutrons) is embedded in so-called generalized parton distributions, which are accessible from deeply virtual Compton scattering. In this ...process, a high energy electron is scattered off a nucleon by exchanging a virtual photon. Then, a highly-energetic real photon is emitted from one of the quarks inside the nucleon, which carries information on the quark's transverse position and longitudinal momentum. By measuring the cross-section of deeply virtual Compton scattering, Compton form factors related to the generalized parton distributions can be extracted. Here, we report the observation of unpolarized deeply virtual Compton scattering off a deuterium target. From the measured photon-electroproduction cross-sections, we have extracted the cross-section of a quasi-free neutron and a coherent deuteron. Due to the approximate isospin symmetry of quantum chromodynamics, we can determine the contributions from the different quark flavours to the helicity-conserved Compton form factors by combining our measurements with previous ones probing the proton's internal structure. These results advance our understanding of the description of the nucleon structure, which is important to solve the proton spin puzzle.
The 2H(e,ep)n cross section was measured in Hall A of the Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility near the top of the quasielastic peak (xBj = 0.964) at a four-momentum transfer squared, Q2 = ...0.665 (GeV/c)2 (= 0.368GeV, W = 2.057GeV), and for recoil momenta up to 550MeV/c. The measured cross section deviates by 1-2 from a state-of-the-art calculation at low recoil momenta. At high recoil momenta the cross section is well described by the same calculation; however, in this region, final-state interactions and interaction currents are predicted to be large, and alternative choices of nucleon-nucleon potential and nucleon current operator may result in significant spread in the calculations.
Abstract
The small binding energy of the hypertriton leads to predictions of the non-existence of bound hypernuclei for isotriplet three-body systems such as nnΛ. However, invariant mass spectroscopy ...at GSI has reported events that may be interpreted as the bound nnΛ state. The nnΛ state was sought by missing-mass spectroscopy via the (e, e′K+) reaction at Jefferson Lab’s experimental Hall A. The present experiment has higher sensitivity to the nnΛ-state investigation in terms of better precision by a factor of about three. The analysis shown in this article focuses on the derivation of the reaction cross-section for the 3H(γ*, K+)X reaction. Events that were detected in an acceptance, where a Monte Carlo simulation could reproduce the data well ($|\delta p/p| \lt 4\%$), were analyzed to minimize the systematic uncertainty. No significant structures were observed with the acceptance cuts, and the upper limits of the production cross-section of the nnΛ state were obtained to be 21 and $31 \, \rm {nb} \, \rm {sr}^{-1}$ at the $90\%$ confidence level when theoretical predictions of (−BΛ, Γ) = (0.25, 0.8) MeV and (0.55, 4.7) MeV, respectively, were assumed. The cross-section result provides valuable information for examining the existence of nnΛ.