Single-spin asymmetries in inclusive deep inelastic scattering and multiparton correlations in the nucleon

TL;DR

This paper investigates the role of two-photon exchange processes, especially involving different quarks, in generating transverse single-spin asymmetries in inclusive deep inelastic scattering, linking theoretical correlators to experimental data.

Contribution

It introduces a detailed analysis of two-photon exchange contributions involving quark correlations and compares model-dependent predictions with recent experimental measurements.

Findings

Transverse target spin asymmetries are computed using different T_F parametrizations.

Results show consistency with recent experimental data.

Implications for understanding single-spin asymmetries in hard scattering are discussed.

Abstract

Transverse single-spin asymmetries in inclusive deep inelastic lepton-nucleon scattering can be generated through multiphoton exchange between the leptonic and the hadronic part of the process. Here we consider the two-photon exchange, and mainly focus on the transverse target spin asymmetry. In particular, we investigate the case where two photons couple to different quarks. Such a contribution involves a quark-photon-quark correlator in the nucleon, which has a (model-dependent) relation to the Efremov-Teryaev-Qiu-Sterman quark-gluon-quark correlator T_F. Using different parametrizations for T_F we compute the transverse target spin asymmetries for both a proton and a neutron target and compare the results to recent experimental data. In addition, potential implications for our general understanding of single-spin asymmetries in hard scattering processes are discussed.