QED corrections to the parity-violating asymmetry in high-energy electron-nucleus collisions

TL;DR

This paper calculates QED corrections to the parity-violating asymmetry in high-energy electron-nucleus collisions, showing a 5% enhancement at GeV energies that impacts neutron radius and skin thickness estimates.

Contribution

It provides a non-perturbative calculation of QED effects on parity asymmetry, refining nuclear structure measurements at high energies.

Findings

QED corrections increase asymmetry by ~5% for certain nuclei

Corrections lead to larger inferred neutron skin thicknesses

Impacts understanding of neutron pressure around nuclear saturation

Abstract

The parity-violating asymmetry, including leading-order QED corrections to the Coulomb potential, is calculated non-perturbatively by solving the Dirac equation. At GeV collision energies and forward scattering angles, QED effects enhance the asymmetry by approximately 5% for the recently measured nuclei 27Al, 48Ca, and 208Pb. The corrections result in a shift of the estimated neutron radius, leading to an increase in the inferred neutron skin thicknesses of these nuclei and, thus, to the pressure neutrons feel around nuclear saturation density.