PHENIX Spin Program, Recent Results

TL;DR

The PHENIX Spin Program at RHIC investigates the spin structure of the proton, providing initial results on asymmetries related to gluon and sea quark polarization using polarized proton collisions.

Contribution

This paper presents the first experimental results on spin asymmetries from the PHENIX experiment at RHIC, advancing understanding of proton spin components.

Findings

First measurements of transverse single-spin asymmetry in pi0 and charged hadron production.

Initial results on longitudinal double-spin asymmetry in pi0 production.

Insights into gluon and sea quark polarization in the proton.

Abstract

Acceleration of polarized protons in the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC) provides a unique tool to study the spin structure of the nucleon. We give a brief overview of the PHENIX program to investigate the unknown gluon and flavor decomposed sea quark polarization in the proton, utilizing polarized proton collisions at RHIC. We report first results from the PHENIX experiment on transverse single-spin asymmetry in pi0 and charged hadron production and longitudinal double-spin asymmetry in pi0 production, at mid-rapidity.