Parity-violating asymmetry of WW bosons produced in pp-pp collisions

The parity-violating asymmetry is an ideal tool to study the quark helicity distribution in the proton. We study the parity-violating asymmetry of $W^{\pm}$ bosons produced by longitudinally polarized $p$-$p$ collision in RHIC, based on predictions of quark distributions of the proton in the SU(6) quark-spectator-diquark model and a perturbative QCD based counting rule analysis. We find that the two models give nearly equal asymmetry for $W^+$ but that for $W^-$ quite different. Therefore future experiments on such quantity can help to clarify different predictions of the value $\Delta d(x)/d(x)$ at $x \to 1$ in the proton.Comment: 11 Latex pages, 9 figures, final version to appear in NP

Target mass corrections and twist-3 in the nucleon spin structure functions

The Nachtmann moment is employed to study the contribution of twist-3 operator to the nucleon spin structure functions. Target mass corrections to the Cornwall-Norton moments of the spin structure functions $g_{1,2}$ are discussed. It is found that the corrections play a sizeable role to the contribution of the twist-3 $\tilde d_2$ extracted from the Cornwall-Norton moments.Comment: 11 pages, 1 figure

On the Q^2 Dependence of Measured Polarized Structure Funtions

We analyse the available data on the polarized asymmetries $A_1$ for proton, neutron and deuteron targets. We use a homogeneous and updated set of unpolarized structure functions to derive $g_1$ from $A_1$, and we accurately correct for the scaling violations in order to obtain $g_1(x,Q^2)$ with the same $Q^2$ for all $x$ values. The contribution to the $Q^2$ evolution of a possible large gluon polarized density is also considered. The implications for the Ellis-Jaffe and for the Bjorken sum rules are discussed.Comment: 11 pages (LaTex) + 4 figures (topdrawer, included at the end) CERN-TH 7023/9

Spin-dependent Parton Distributions from Polarized Structure Function Data

In the past year, polarized deep inelastic scattering experiments at CERN and SLAC have obtained structure function measurements off proton, neutron and deuteron targets at a level of precision never before achieved. The measurements can be used to test the Bjorken and Ellis-Jaffe sum rules, and also to obtain information on the parton distributions in polarized nucleons. We perform a global leading-order QCD fit to the proton deep inelastic data in order to extract the spin-dependent parton distributions. By using parametric forms which are consistent with theoretical expectations at large and small $x$, we find that the quark distributions are now rather well constrained. We assume that there is no significant intrinsic polarization of the strange quark sea. The data are then consistent with a modest amount of the proton's spin carried by the gluon, although the shape of the gluon distribution is not well constrained, and several qualitatively different shapes are suggested. The spin-dependent distributions we obtain can be used as input to phenomenological studies for future polarized hadron-hadron and lepton-hadron colliders.Comment: 23 pages, DTP/94/3

The nucleon's octet axial-charge g_A^8 with chiral corrections

The value of the nucleon's flavour-singlet axial-charge extracted from polarised deep inelastic scattering is sensitive to the value of the octet axial-charge g_A^8 which is usually taken from an analysis of hyperon beta-decays within the framework of SU(3) symmetry, namely 0.58 \pm 0.03. Using the Cloudy Bag model we find that the value of g_A^8 is reduced by as much as 20% below the usual phenomenological value. This increases the value of the flavour singlet axial charge (g_A^0|_inv) derived from deep inelastic data and significantly reduces the difference between it and g_A^8.Comment: 12 page

Analytic Approaches to the Evolution of Polarised Parton Distributions at Small xx

The $Q^2$ evolution of polarised parton distributions at small $x$ is studied. Various analytic approximations are critically discussed. We compare the full evolution with that obtained from the leading-pole approximation to the splitting functions, and show that the validity of this approximation depends critically on the $x \to 0$ behaviour of the starting distributions. A new analytic solution which is valid at small $x$ is obtained, and its domain of applicability is discussed.Comment: 14 pages, LATeX, 4 figures availabe as .uu-fil

Nucleon quark distributions in a covariant quark-diquark model

Spin-dependent and spin-independent quark light-cone momentum distributions and structure functions are calculated for the nucleon. We utilize a modified Nambu-Jona-Lasinio model in which confinement is simulated by eliminating unphysical thresholds for nucleon decay into quarks. The nucleon bound state is obtained by solving the Faddeev equation in the quark-diquark approximation, where both scalar and axial-vector diquark channels are included. We find excellent agreement between our model results and empirical data.Comment: 6 pages, 7 figure

Valence Quark Spin Distribution Functions

The hyperfine interactions of the constituent quark model provide a natural explanation for many nucleon properties, including the Delta-N splitting, the charge radius of the neutron, and the observation that the proton's quark distribution function ratio d(x)/u(x)->0 as x->1. The hyperfine-perturbed quark model also makes predictions for the nucleon spin-dependent distribution functions. Precision measurements of the resulting asymmetries A_1^p(x) and A_1^n(x) in the valence region can test this model and thereby the hypothesis that the valence quark spin distributions are "normal".Comment: 16 pages, 2 Postscript figure