Evidence for a positive longitudinal double-spin asymmetry = 0.24
+-0.11 (stat) +-0.02 (syst) in the cross section for exclusive diffractive
rho^0(770) vector meson production in polarised lepton-proton scattering was
observed by the HERMES experiment. The longitudinally polarised 27.56 GeV HERA
positron beam was scattered off a longitudinally polarised pure hydrogen gas
target. The average invariant mass of the photon-proton system has a value of
= 4.9 GeV, while the average negative squared four-momentum of the virtual
photon is = 1.7 GeV^2. The ratio of the present result to the
corresponding spin asymmetry in inclusive deep-inelastic scattering is in
agreement with an early theoretical prediction based on the generalised vector
meson dominance model.Comment: 10 pages, 4 embedded figures, LaTe