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# Raman spectra of MgB2 at high pressure and topological electronic transition

## Introduction

The discovery of superconductivity recently in MgB2  has initiated a number of studies related to the pressure behavior of the crystalline structure, phonon spectrum and superconductivity transition temperature of this material \[2-8\]. The high pressure experiments, which traditionally are used to test the structural stability of materials, can play also an important role in the understanding of the superconductivity mechanism. The experimentally observed pressure-induced linear decrease of $`T_c`$  is in general agreement with theoretical estimations based on the BCS theory. Theoretical calculations show that MgB2 can be treated as a phonon mediated superconductor with very strong electron-phonon coupling of the in-plane optical E2g phonon mode to the partially occupied planar boron s bands near the Fermi surface . The strong coupling contributes considerably to the anharmonicity of the Raman active E2g mode manifested by its very broad lineshape, ranging from 460 $`cm^1`$ to 660 $`cm^1`$ according to various calculations \[9, 11-13\]. The other three phonon modes of MgB2 with symmetries B1g, A2u and E1u are harmonic and show an insignificant electron-phonon coupling .

The first report on Raman scattering in MgB2 revealed a broad asymmetric peak at $``$ 580 $`cm^1`$ , while subsequent investigations showed the E2g mode frequency near 615-620 $`cm^1`$ . An initial high pressure Raman experiment up to 15 GPa has shown a large linear pressure shift of the E2g phonon frequency . Further extension of the pressure range up to 44 GPa revealed the change in the slope of the linear pressure dependence at $``$ 23 GPa for the isotopically pure Mg10B2 samples . Similar singularities are observed in the dependence of $`T_c`$ vs. relative variation of volume, $`V/V_0`$, , which exhibits change in the slope of the linear dependence near the values of $`V/V_0`$ corresponding to pressures of $``$ 20 GPa and $``$ 15 GPa for Mg10B2 and Mg11B2 isotopically pure samples, respectively. This behavior in the pressure dependence of $`T_c`$ was also observed at $``$9 GPa, for MgB2 samples prepared from natural boron isotope mixture . Taking into account that the pressure dependence of the lattice parameters of MgB2 is smooth and does not show any structural phase transitions in the pressure range up to 40 GPa , the observed singularities in the pressure dependence of $`T_c`$ and E2g phonon frequency were supposed to be related to a Lifshitz isostructural topological electronic transition .

We have measured the Raman spectra of MgB2 as a function of pressure, up to 32 GPa, at room temperature. The main goal in our experiments was to study carefully the pressure dependence of E2g phonon mode and to examine possible phase transitions in the MgB2 system. Despite the fact that there have been published excellent investigations on high pressure Raman scattering by Struzhkin et al.  and Goncharov et al. , we believe that the results obtained in the present study show new and interesting aspects and complete somehow the study of the pressure behavior of the E2g phonon mode.

## Experimental Details

Ceramic samples of MgB2 were prepared by direct synthesis from the constituent elements. The initial materials were amorphous boron powder (natural mixture of isotopes, atomic mass 10.811) and pieces of metallic magnesium, both better than 99.9 % purity. The stoichiometric weights of materials were placed in molybdenum crucible and heated up to 1400o C into the medium-pressure furnace under Ar-gas pressure of $``$ 12 bar followed by annealing there for an hour. During the heating, the synthesis of is believed to occur at $``$ 900o C. The resulting product was a bronze-color compact material with density $``$ 2.23 g/cm3 and grain size from 6 to 30 microns. X-ray powder diffraction pattern of synthesized samples showed the hexagonal ($`𝐚`$=3.086 Åand$`𝐛`$ =3.52 Å) to be the main constituent, with small quantities of MgO and metallic Mg.

Raman spectra were recorded using a triple monochromator (DILOR XY-500) equipped with a CCD liquid-nitrogen cooled detector system. The spectra were taken in the back-scattering geometry by the use of the micro-Raman system comprising by an OLYMPUS microscope equipped with objectives of 100x and 20x magnification and a spatial resolution of $``$1.7 $`\mu m`$ and $``$ 8 $`\mu m`$, respectively. Small good facetted bronze-colored grains of MgB2 with typical size of $`20\mu m`$ were selected for Raman measurements. The spectral width of the system was $``$ 8 $`cm^1`$ and the 514.5 nm line of an $`Ar^+`$ laser with beam power below 10 mW, measured before the cell, was used for excitation. Measurements of the Raman spectra at high pressure were carried out in two independent pressure cycles using a diamond anvil cell (DAC) of Mao-Bell type . The small chips of the MgB2 ceramics selected for their prominent E2g -mode Raman signal were loaded into DAC. The 4:1 methanol-ethanol mixture was used as pressure transmitting medium and the ruby fluorescence technique was used for pressure calibration . The E2g phonon frequency was obtained by fitting a Gaussian function to the experimental peak after background subtraction.

## Results and Discussion

The Raman spectra of ceramic samples of MgB2 , taken at normal conditions, consist of a broad peak centered near $``$ 590 $`cm^1`$. This frequency value is lower than the earlier reported frequency value of the E2g mode . Probing the ceramic MgB2 samples, using high spatial resolution of the micro-Raman system, gave us the possibility to identify small crystalline grains of MgB2 whose Raman spectra differ drastically from that of inclusions of MgO or metallic Mg.

The Raman spectra of the MgB2 for various pressures up to $``$29 GPa and at room temperature are shown in Figure 1. The initial spectrum at 1.1 GPa (Fig. 1a) contains the broad $`(FWHM250cm^1)`$ peak near $`600cm^1`$ related to the Raman active E2g mode. The relatively sharp peak near $`880cm^1`$ is associated with a methanol-ethanol mixture peak. The intensity of this peak gradually drops with the increase of pressure and vanishes at $``$12 GPa upon mixture solidification. When pressure increases the E2g peak shifts to higher energy (Fig. 1b-1f) and somehow broadens, while its Raman intensity does not change noticeably. The release of pressure, down to 1.2 GPa (Fig. 1g), restores the main features of the initial Raman spectrum.

The pressure dependence of the E2g mode frequency, worked out for various pressure runs, is shown in Figure 2. The open circles show the data for increasing pressure up to $``$20 GPa, while the closed circles are related to the decrease of pressure down to $``$1.2 GPa. The data marked by open squares are recorded at the subsequent upstroke pressure cycle from $``$1.2 GPa to $``$32 GPa performed immediately after the release of pressure without disassembling of the DAC. The shaded areas near $``$5 GPa and $``$18 GPa separate the regions where the pressure behavior of E2g phonon frequency can be fitted to a linear dependence with different slopes $`\omega /P`$. The largest slope $`\omega /P=18cm^1`$/GPa is found for the region $`5P`$ 18 GPa, while for P$`>`$18 GPa the slope $`\omega /P`$ is 6 $`cm^1`$/ GPa. The most intrigue behavior is observed in the pressure region 1 bar $``$ 5 GPa, where the route (open cycles in Fig. 2) of the two upstroke pressure cycles (new cell loading) differs from the route of the downstroke (solid cycles in Fig. 2) and upstroke (open squares) cycles without the total release of pressure in the DAC. The slopes $`\omega /P`$ of both routes are slightly different, $``$ 7 $`cm^1`$/GPa for the new loading and $``$ 9 $`cm^1`$/GPa for the recycling routes. Note that the spread out of experimental data on the E2g mode frequency is consistent with the accuracy in the peak position determination, which was found to be close to $`\pm `$10 $`cm^1`$.

The pressure dependence of the mE2g ode frequency demonstrates two singularities near $``$5 GPa and $``$18 GPa. These results are partly correlated with the Raman data obtained by Struzhkin et al., which have been reported a singularity in the slope of the phonon pressure dependence near $``$23 GPa for the isotopic pure Mg10B2 sample and near $``$15 GPa in the pressure dependence of $`T_c`$ for the isotopic pure Mg11B2 sample . Taking into account that the samples in the present investigation were prepared from natural mixture of boron isotopes we think that the singularity near $``$18 GPa has the same origin as those observed in  for isotopic pure samples. As for the singularity at $``$ 5 GPa, it seems to be a new result revealed by recording the spectra for small steps of pressure increase in this interval, a practice which is not apparent in the other studies .

The experimental data for the pressure dependence of the E2g phonon mode are seemingly in contradiction with the X-ray data on MgB2 . Although the Raman data show distinct singularities in their pressure dependence, the pressure dependencies of the $`𝐚`$ and $`𝐜`$ parameters of the hexagonal lattice are smooth and do not show any structural phase transition in the pressure region up to 40 GPa . The possible explanation for this contradiction may be related to the Lifshitz topological electronic transition  related to the pressure-induced changes of the topology of the Fermi surface. In such a transition the electron density of states on the Fermi level as well as the electron dynamics possess some peculiar features, which lead to anomalies of the electron thermodynamic and kinetic characteristics. The band structure calculations for the MgB2  show the splitting of the planar boron $`\sigma `$ bands along the $`\mathrm{\Gamma }A`$ line near the Fermi surface, which creates the conditions for a Lifshitz-type transition under the application of high pressure. Tissen et al.  have suggested that MgB2 undergoes the Lifshitz topological electronic transition to explain the cusp in the pressure dependence of the $`T_c`$ near 9 GPa. Later the same suggestion has been used to explain the changes in the slopes of the linear pressure dependencies of the E2g phonon frequency and superconducting transition temperature $`T_c`$ for isotopic pure Mg11B2 and Mg10B2 samples . We believe that the manifestation of the electronic topological transition in the pressure dependence of the E2g phonon mode is related to the strong electron-phonon coupling of this mode to the planar boron $`\sigma `$ bands.

Concerning the singularity in the E2g phonon pressure dependence near $``$5 GPa we believe that this may be related to some transformation of the initial ceramic material associated with a trend to phase homogenization under high pressure. It seems that the recovered material is more homogeneous as far as its pressure response and the E2g phonon frequency is lower than that of the starting material, therefore an investigation of the $`T_c`$ for a high pressure treated ceramic sample might be interesting. In addition, the most detailed X-ray data of Prassides et al. , related to the pressure dependence of the lattice volume, may include an indication for some singularity near $``$ 4.5 GPa. In any case we think that, to clarify this suggestion, further experiments with high quality crystalline samples are necessary.

Finally, we would like to address the difference in the E2g phonon frequency reported in the various Raman studies at normal conditions . We think that its origin may be related to the difference in the stoichiometry of ceramic samples. For example, a recent publication  indicates that the ceramic samples in fact have various stoichiometries, Mg1-xB2 with $`0x0.2`$, and superconducting transition temperature $`T_c`$ varies accordingly from 37 K to 39 K.

In conclusion, the pressure dependence of the E2g phonon mode frequency measured as a function of pressure, up to 32 GPa, shows two singularities near $``$5 GPa and $``$18 GPa. The singularity at $``$5 GPa may be related to the homogenization of ceramic samples induced by pressure, while the singularity at $``$18 GPa may be related to a Lifshitz topological electronic transition .

## Acknowledgments

The support by the General Secretariat for Research and Technology (GSRT), Greece, grant $`\mathrm{\Pi }ENE\mathrm{\Delta }`$, 99$`E\mathrm{\Delta }`$/62 is acknowledged. K. P. M. acknowledges the support by the GSRT, Greece, and the Russian Foundation for Fundamental Research, Russia, grant $`\mathrm{\#}`$ 99-02-17555.

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## Figure Captions

Fig. 1. Raman spectra of the MgB2 for various pressures up to $``$29 GPa and room temperature. Asterisk indicates a methanol-ethanol mixture peak.
Fig. 2. Pressure dependence of the frequency of E2g phonon in MgB2 . The open (closed) symbols are related to the increase (decrease) of pressure. The shaded areas show the pressure regions where the changes in the slopes of linear pressure shift were observed.


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# 1 Introduction

## 1 Introduction

Deep inelastic scattering (DIS) experiments have played important roles in understanding the partonic structure of hadrons and in establishing the theory of quantum chromodynamics (QCD), the strong sector of the Standard Model (SM). Our current knowledge of the parton densities in hadrons is primarily derived from the structure functions measured in these experiments .

A precise knowledge of these parton density functions (PDFs) is needed both for providing reliable predictions for processes involved in hadron-hadron colliders such as the Tevatron and the LHC, and for achieving precision measurements at these colliders. A good example is the measurement of the mass of the $`W`$ boson from the Tevatron. The mass, which is relevant for incisive tests of the SM of electroweak interactions, receives a non-negligible systematic contribution from the uncertainty of the PDFs .

The precision of the PDFs also affects directly interpretations of data measured at hadron colliders and searches for physics beyond the SM. One example is the excess of jet events at large transverse energies over perturbative QCD calculations reported earlier by the CDF collaboration . The excess, which has initiated considerable speculations of possible new physics, could well be accommodated by a higher than expected gluon density at large $`x`$ . Another example is the excess of events at high momentum transfer ($`Q^2`$) with respect to the standard DIS expectation reported by both the H1 and ZEUS experiments at HERA based on the earlier low statistics sample taken from 1994 to 1996 . The excess could be due to a statistical fluctuation, an imprecise knowledge of the PDFs at large $`x`$, or a resonance production of leptoquarks or scalar quarks in $`R_p`$-violating supersymmetric models .

In this paper, various constraints on the PDFs from fixed-target DIS experiments and from hadron-hadron colliders will first be briefly reviewed (section 2), the inclusive cross-section measurements at high $`Q^2`$ from HERA will then be presented and their impact on the PDFs discussed (section 3).

## 2 Current knowledge on the parton density functions

The traditional, but still the most important, constraint on the PDFs is from structure function data measured in DIS experiments. Shown in figure 1 are four precise measurements from BCDMS , CCFR , E665  and NMC  and their kinematic ranges .

These data constrain the PDFs mainly in the medium and large $`x`$ range111The best knowledge on the PDFs at small $`x`$ is obtained from HERA structure function $`F_2`$ data. This is, however, not the subject of this paper..

The precision of the structure function data does not, however, imply a good precision for the PDFs since their derivation and error estimation depend on a whole complexity of experimental and theoretical inputs involved in a global analysis such as MRST  or CTEQ . Here are a number of sources of uncertainty:

* Experimental systematic uncertainties: The most precise data are usually limited by systematic, rather than statistical, uncertainties. The correlations of different systematics on the measurements among and across experiments are not at all trivial to take properly into account.
* Higher-twist contribution: The data are located at relative low $`Q^2`$ and large $`x`$. The higher-twist contribution is expected to be important as it behaves as $`[(1x)Q^2]^1`$ with respect to the leading-twist contribution.
* Parameterization form: In a global analysis, the parton densities are parameterized in a certain functional form. The freedom in choosing the functional form and the corresponding initial scale is a source of the uncertainty.
* Large nuclear corrections: As far as the $`d`$ valence quark density is concerned, it is constrained mainly by the deuterium data, to which the nuclear binding corrections can be important.

Apart from the structure function data, a few other processes from the fixed-target experiments also provide valuable constraints on the PDFs. This is the case for the lepton-pair production or the Drell-Yan process (the dominant leading-order subprocess being $`q\overline{q}\gamma ^{}g,\gamma ^{}l\overline{l}`$), which constrains the sea quark distributions in the proton. The asymmetry between the $`u`$ and $`d`$ quark flavors, which cannot be easily determined from the structure function data, is constrained by the asymmetry in the Drell-Yan production. The direct constraint on the gluon density could in principle be obtained from the prompt photon production ($`qg\gamma X`$). However, the large discrepancies between measurements and theoretical predictions and among measurements carried out by different experiment groups  prevent us from using these data at present. Represented in figure 2(a) are the kinematic ranges for these processes. Figure 2(b) shows other constraining processes from the collider experiments UA2, CDF and D0. In addition to the direct photon process, the $`W`$ asymmetry constrains the $`d`$ over $`u`$ ratio, $`d/u`$, for $`x`$ around 0.1 and for $`Q`$ around the mass of the $`W`$ boson. The inclusive jet data from the Tevatron provide a potential source for constraining the gluon density at large $`x`$.

Despite the large kinematic coverage of the different data, the resulting uncertainty of various PDFs is far from uniform. In general, the precision is best in the medium region but still rather poor towards the kinematic limit at large $`x`$. This is well illustrated by the behavior of the $`d/u`$ ratio at $`x1`$ (figure 3). On the theoretical side, the model predictions vary considerably between 0 and 0.5 with non-perturbative QCD-motivated predictions at around 0.2 . On the experimental side, for $`x<0.3`$, there are precise data from both $`W`$ asymmetry and DIS data and the nuclear corrections to the DIS data are insignificant; for $`0.3<x<0.7`$, there are only DIS data which may be subject to large nuclear corrections; at larger $`x`$, no reliable data are available. In an analysis by Yang and Bodek , they showed that the description of the $`W`$ asymmetry and NMC structure function ratio data is improved with $`d/u0.2`$ as $`x1`$ and with the nuclear binding corrections applied to the deuterium data. The analysis by Kuhlmann et al  showed that if the ratio $`d/u`$ is around 0.2, the NMC data indeed need a nuclear correction, but the converse is not necessarily true. The large spread of the curves shown in figure 3, corresponding to three possible fits to the existing data, shows how uncertain the current PDFs are at large $`x`$.

## 3 HERA impact on the parton density functions

The structure functions measured by the HERA experiments H1 and ZEUS have provided a unique constraint on the PDFs at small $`x`$, in particular on the gluon density . Here we shall present inclusive cross-sections at high $`Q^2`$ measured with three important data samples collected by both experiments since 1994, and discuss their impact on the PDFs at large $`x`$. The first $`e^+p`$ data sample, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 35.6 pb-1222The number shows the integrated luminosity from H1. The data samples from ZEUS are comparable., was taken from 1994 to 1997 at a center-of-mass energy of 300 GeV. Both the $`e^{}p`$ data of 1998-1999 and the $`e^+p`$ data of 1999-2000 are taken at a center-of-mass energy of 320 GeV resulting from the increased proton energy of 920 GeV. The corresponding integrated luminosities are, respectively, 16.4 pb-1 and 65 pb-1.

Figure 4 shows the neutral current (NC) reduced cross-sections333The NC reduced cross-section $`\stackrel{~}{\sigma }_{\mathrm{NC}}`$ is defined as $`\stackrel{~}{\sigma }=(xQ^4/2\pi \alpha ^2Y_+)^2\sigma /xQ^2`$ with $`Y_+=1+(1y)^2`$. measured with the 1996-1997 $`e^+p`$ and 1998-1999 $`e^{}p`$ ZEUS data . The $`e^+p`$ and $`e^{}p`$ cross-sections are found to be comparable444The difference due to the change in the center-of-mass energies is expected at a few percent level. at low $`Q^2`$ ($`<1000\mathrm{GeV}^2`$ or so). This is understood to be due to the dominance of $`\gamma `$ exchange. At higher $`Q^2`$, the $`e^{}p`$ cross-sections are measured to be increasingly larger than those of $`e^+p`$, demonstrating the $`\gamma Z`$ interference contribution. The cross-section asymmetry allows the structure function $`x\stackrel{~}{F}_3`$ (figure 6) to be determined for the first time at HERA . As this structure function measures the difference between the quark and anti-quark densities ($`x\stackrel{~}{F}_32_ie_ia_ix(q_i\overline{q}_i)`$ with $`e_i`$ and $`a_i`$ being, respectively, the electric charge of quark $`i`$ and its axial coupling to the $`Z`$ boson), it is thus sensitive to the valence quark densities at large $`x`$.

A comparison of the charged current (CC) reduced cross-sections555The CC reduced cross-section $`\stackrel{~}{\sigma }`$ is defined as $`\stackrel{~}{\sigma }=(2\pi x/G_F^2)((Q^2+M_W^2)/M_W^2)^2^2\sigma /xQ^2`$ with $`G_F`$ and $`M_W`$ being, respectively, the Fermi coupling constant and the mass of the exchanged $`W`$ boson. measured by H1  is shown in figure 6. The difference in the cross-sections results mainly from different quark flavors probed by the exchanged $`W^\pm `$ bosons. The CC cross-sections at high $`Q^2`$ thus provide a unique source to directly constrain the $`u`$ and $`d`$ valence quarks at large $`x`$.

The $`x`$ dependence of the measured NC and CC cross-sections  for $`Q^2>1000\mathrm{GeV}^2`$ and $`y<0.9`$ is compared with the standard DIS expectation in figure 7. From the ratio plots, the NC cross-sections at $`x=0.65`$ are seen to lie considerably below the expectations, whereas the CC $`e^+p`$ cross-sections at large $`x`$ (dominated by the $`d`$ valence quark contribution) have the tendency to lie above the expectation although the uncertainty of both the measurement and the expectation are large.

In order to quantify the impact of these measurements on the PDFs at large $`x`$, two methods are employed to extract the $`u`$ and $`d`$ valence quark densities using the HERA data alone.

The first method in essence is a global NLO QCD fit like those performed by the MRST and CTEQ groups . The main difference is in the number of experimental data sets used. The results of the H1 fit  are shown in figure 8 together with those obtained from a second method. In the second method, the $`u`$ and $`d`$ quark densities are extracted locally from the measured cross-sections $`(^2\sigma /xQ^2)_{\mathrm{meas}}`$ as:

$$xq_v(x,Q^2)=(^2\sigma (x,Q^2)/xQ^2)_{\mathrm{meas}}\left(\frac{xq_v(x,Q^2)}{^2\sigma (x,Q^2)/xQ^2}\right)_{\mathrm{th}}$$
(1)
where the second factor on the right-hand-side of the equation is the theoretical expectation. Only those points where the $`xq_v`$ contribution is greater than 70% of the corresponding cross-section are considered666The extracted parton densities are thus rather independent of the theoretical input as the uncertainty on the dominant valence quark contribution and that of the cross-section largely cancel in the ratio.. The first such extraction was performed by H1 for two values of $`x`$ at 0.25 and 0.4 using the 1994-1997 $`e^+p`$ NC and CC cross-sections . With the new $`e^{}p`$ 1998-1999 and $`e^+p`$ 1999-2000 data, similar extractions were made and were extended to $`x=0.65`$ for $`u`$ . In practice, the $`d`$ valence quark density is determined from the combined $`e^+p`$ CC cross-sections, whereas the $`u`$ valence quark density is determined from the combined $`e^+p`$ NC, $`e^{}p`$ NC and $`e^{}p`$ CC cross-sections. Three independent determinations of $`xu_v`$ are then combined.

The valence quark distributions at large $`x`$ can thus be quantitatively constrained for the first time by the HERA data alone although the experimental uncertainties (between 6% at $`x=0.25,0.4`$ and $`10`$% at $`x=0.65`$ for $`xu_v`$ and $`20`$% for $`xd_v`$) are still large. The determined parton densities agree well with those parameterizations, which use the fixed-target data as the main constraining source, except for $`xu_v`$ at $`x=0.65`$, where the former is about $`17`$% lower than the latter with little dependence on $`Q^2`$ in the covered kinematic range. The difference (less than two standard deviations) remains however not very significant.

Similar results  from ZEUS based on an NLO QCD fit using ZEUS data only are shown in figure 9. In comparison with the global QCD fit which uses both the fixed-target data and the 1996-1997 $`e^+p`$ ZEUS data, the ZEUS data prefer a larger $`xu_v`$ for $`x`$ around 0.2 and smaller $`xu_v`$ at larger $`x`$. A shift towards large $`x`$ is also observed in the $`xd_v`$ distribution although the shift stays essentially within the uncertainty.

## 4 Summary and future prospects

The structure function and other measurements from fixed-target DIS and hadron-hadron collider experiments have provided us important inputs for constraining the parton density distributions. In the past few years there has been a renewed interest in the parton density distributions at large $`x`$, in particular the behavior of the $`d/u`$ ratio when $`x1`$. Considerable progress has been made towards understanding some of the uncertainties in the individual measurements that contribute to our knowledge of the large-$`x`$ parton distributions. The current situation is that the large-$`x`$ distributions are less well constrained than the medium-$`x`$ ones and need additional inputs for improvements.

HERA has made steady progress since 1992. The early runs have provided unique structure function data for settling the behavior of parton (in particular the gluon) densities at small $`x`$. The high statistics samples taken in the recent years now allow the inclusive cross-sections be measured for both neutral and charged current interactions at high $`Q^2`$. These cross-sections have started to give quantitative constraints on the valence quark densities at large $`x`$. HERA is finishing its upgrade program. After the upgrade, the machine will provide about a factor of five increase in the peak luminosity and polarized lepton beams. The upgraded machine and the improved detectors will thus significantly improve in the next few years the measurement of the cross-sections and the knowledge of the parton densities at large $`x`$. These data are unique as they are free from any nuclear corrections inherent in the structure function data of the deuteron.

There are other possibilities by which the $`u`$ and $`d`$ valence quark densities at large $`x`$ can be further constrained. One possibility  is to use semi-inclusive DIS data on hadron production in the current fragmentation region to measure the relative yields of $`\pi ^+`$ and $`\pi ^{}`$ mesons. The idea is fairly simple: at large $`z`$ ($`z`$ being the fractional energy of the hadron), the $`u`$ quark fragments primarily into a $`\pi ^+`$, while a $`d`$ fragments into a $`\pi ^{}`$, so that at large $`x`$ and $`z`$ one could have a direct measure of the $`d/u`$ ratio, again free from the nuclear corrections when a proton target is used.

On the large-$`x`$ gluon density, future improvements are expected from the direct photon data once the current discrepancies between the data and the predictions and among the data are resolved. The improved Tevatron jet data at Run II should also help. A third possibility  is to use the Drell-Yan process in the phase space where the leading-order subprocess $`qg\gamma ^{}q,\gamma ^{}\mu ^+\mu ^{}`$ dominates.

The uncertainties of the parton density distributions translate directly into uncertainties in essentially every measurement made at a hadron-hadron collider; it is therefore imperative that these distributions be well determined.

## Acknowledgments

The author wishes to thank his colleagues in the H1 and ZEUS collaborations for the measurements presented in this paper. He also thanks the organizers of the workshop for the invitation and for the unique hospitality at the Ringberg castle.

## References


text:
# Theory of star formation in the central kiloparsec

## 1. Introduction

There are essentially three distinct star formation mechanisms that include most of the observations: gravitational instabilities leading to dense clouds and then stars by fragmentation, sequential triggering of dense clouds by other stars, and turbulent triggering of dense clouds by supersonic compression in a turbulent flow. These processes operate in the main disks of galaxies. We consider here whether they also operate in the inner kpc regions where the conditions are sufficiently different that the proportion of the three may change.

### 1.1. Gravitational Instabilities

Gravitational instabilities in the main disks of galaxies produce structures on kpc scales, including flocculent and grand-design spiral arms, and regularly spaced star-forming regions and other giant cloud complexes inside spiral arms (e.g., M51: Kuno et al. 1995). Secondary gravitational instabilities may occur on smaller scales in the cooled and colliding parts of these primary instabilities (e.g., Wada & Norman 1999, 2001).

Nuclear disks have similar structures. Some galaxies have nuclear grand design spiral arms (e.g., D15 in Coma – Caldwell, Rose, & Dendy 1999; NGC 5248 – Laine et al. 1999) and others have long irregular arms that resemble multiple-arm density waves in main disks (e.g., NGC 7469 and VIIZw031 observed by Scoville et al. 2000). Massive patches of star formation can form in either of these arms. Nuclear regions can also have rings with regularly spaced star formation, as in ESO 565-11 (Buta, Crocker & Byrd 1999).

The spatial scales for nuclear spirals and star formation are much smaller than they are in main galaxy disks. In nuclear regions, spirals can be only several hundred pc long and tens of pc wide; even the largest star-forming regions are only several tens of pc in size. The smaller sizes in nuclear regions are the result of a smaller Jeans length, which comes from a higher ambient density without a significantly higher velocity dispersion.

Gravitational instabilities are also clearly present in some larger starbursts involving whole galaxy disks. NGC 6090 is a merger system (Mazzarella & Boroson 1993) with a molecular surface density of $`3\times 10^3`$ M pc-2 that peaks in a region between the two nuclei (Bryant & Scoville 1999). Color maps of this system in Dinshaw et al. (1999) show four equally-spaced knots of star formation along an arc with a length of several kpc. These knots are like the beads in normal spirals arms, but in NGC 6090, they are much denser. NGC 253 also has an enormous cluster in the central region with several thousand O-type stars and an age comparable to 1 My (Watson et al. 1996). NGC 5253 has a similar dense cluster near the center (Turner, Beck, & Ho 2000). These giant clusters do not appear to be simple extrapolations of a smooth cluster mass function because there is nothing else like them in the galaxies. They are also not near obvious pressure sources or shells as if they were sequentially triggered, nor are they part of a fractal hierarchy of structures as might result from turbulence. They appear to be isolated cases of gravitational collapse to single giant clusters.

### 1.2. Sequential Triggering

Many of the clusters in the solar neighborhood have been triggered by external pressures from existing HII regions and stellar winds. Reviews of this process are in Elmegreen (1998) and Elmegreen et al. (2000). Examples in the recent literature include the Rosette nebula (Phelps & Lada 1997), Orion nebula (Bally et al. 1987; Lada et al. 1991; Dutrey, et al. 1991; Reipurth, Rodriguez & Chini 1999), Trifid nebula (Lefloch & Cernicharo 2000), rho Ophiuchus (de Geus 1992), Upper Sco OB association (Preibisch & Zinnecker 1999), and W5 (Kerton & Martin 2000).

Occasionally a supernova remnant is seen to have triggered star formation along the periphery. This should be rare because supernova remnants are usually short-lived compared to the triggering time. G349.7+0.2 seems to be an example (Reynoso & Mangum 2000). Other shells have triggered star formation (Xie & Goldsmith 1994; Yamaguchi et al. 2001), but they are older than single supernova remnants and were probably formed by a combination of supernova and stellar wind pressures (McCray & Kafatos 1987).

Giant shells in other galaxies have triggered star formation too (Brinks & Bajaja 1986; Puche et al. 1992; Wilcots & Miller 1998; Steward et al. 2000; Stewart & Walter 2000). IC 2574 (Walter & Brinks 1999; Steward & Walter 2000) has HII regions on the perimeter of a shell with clusters $`3`$ My old and another cluster in the center of the shell that is 11 My old.

There is also evidence for sequential triggering in starburst regions, like 30 Dor (Walborn et al. 1999), but not much evidence yet for this process in the central kpc regions of galaxies outside the Milky Way. In our own central region, the giant molecular cloud Sgr B2 was recently found to contain shells in NH3 maps, and these shells contain hot cores on their periphery – evidence for triggering of massive stars (Martin-Pintado et al. 1999). There is little clear evidence yet for shells and two-stage star formation in other galaxy nuclei. Alonso-Herrero, Ryder, & Knapen (2001) suggested that HII regions in the nuclear region of NGC 2903 were excited by stars triggered by older clusters seen nearby as IR sources, but the clusters inside the HII regions have not been found yet, and they could, in principle, be excited by radiation escaping from the existing IR clusters.

Clear evidence for sequential triggering in the nuclear regions of galaxies may be difficult to get. The high rates of shear and the small disk scale heights in inner galaxy regions should distort any shells that form, making them hard to recognize. The length scales for triggering are usually small too, perhaps 10 pc in a local GMC and 1 pc in a dense nuclear GMC. This makes the resolution required very high.

Sequential triggering could actually be less important than spontaneous gravitational instabilities in inner galaxy disks because the dynamical time, $`\left(G\rho \right)^{1/2}`$, at the extreme density of a nuclear disk is comparable to or less than the stellar evolution time of $`1`$ My. This means that spontaneous instabilities could fill a region with star formation before the dying stars from the first generation get a chance to supernova and trigger much themselves.

### 1.3. Turbulence Triggering

Turbulence triggers cloud and star formation by compressing gas that cools and becomes gravitationally unstable. In main galaxy disks, this compression can produce star fields with a fractal character (Gomez et al. 1993; Elmegreen & Elmegreen 2001) and it can give a correlation between age and scale (Harris & Zaritsky 1999) or between duration of star formation and scale (Efremov & Elmegreen 1998; Battinelli & Efremov 1999; Scalo & Chappell 1999; Nomura & Kamaya 2001). Star formation times can be very short when clouds are formed by supersonic motions (Ballesteros-Paredes, Hartmann, & Vazquez-Semadeni 1999).

There have been many numerical simulations of cloud and star formation triggered by compressible turbulence (MacLow & Ossenkopf 2000; Pichardo et al. 2000; Klessen, Heitsch, & MacLow 2000; Vázquez-Semadeni, Gazol, & Scalo 2000; Semelin & Combes 2000; Ostriker, Stone, & Gammie 2001; Heitsch, Mac Low, & Klessen 2001; Toomre & Kalnajs 1991; Wada & Norman 1999, 2001). The converging regions increase the density and produce clouds, which can then become gravitationally unstable and make clusters and stars.

The clumpy and fractal structure of supersonically turbulent gas helps explain the mass functions of clouds and clusters (Fleck 1996; Elmegreen & Falgarone 1996; Stützki et al. 1998; Elmegreen & Efremov 1997; Elmegreen 2001a). This mass function, which is $`M^2dM`$, is found at the high mass end of old globular clusters (Ashman, Conti, & Zepf 1995), for young globular clusters in starburst regions (Whitmore & Schweizer 1995; Zhang & Fall 1999), open clusters in the solar neighborhood (Battinelli et al. 1994), and OB associations in galaxies (Kennicutt, Edgar, & Hodge 1989; Elmegreen & Salzer 1999; McKee & Williams 1997).

The case for turbulence triggering in the central kpc is not well documented. There is no observation yet of a size-age or size-duration correlation for star formation, nor is there good evidence for fractal structure in the positions of young stars. Nevertheless, the dust spirals in some nuclear regions have a fractal quality reminiscent of turbulence (Elmegreen, Elmegreen, & Eberwein 2001), and the morphology of these spirals suggests shear is very important. Thus the spatial correlations and space-time correlations that show up well in low-shear environments such as the Large Magellanic Cloud may be present but difficult to recognize in the central kpc regions of spiral galaxies.

## 2. Star formation rates

The three processes of star formation mentioned above combine to give the net star formation rate in a galaxy. This total rate may be saturated to the maximum possible value given the structure of the gas; i.e., saturated to the value at which every suitable region forms stars on a dynamical time scale that is proportional to the inverse square root of the density (Elmegreen 2001b). The mechanism of star formation may not matter for the total rate; if one mechanism does not work well, then another will take over to give the same total rate.

The combination of processes also means that while gravity, star formation pressures, and turbulence may structure the positions and densities of gas clouds, the actual triggering processes inside these clouds may be a different combination of mechanisms. A cloud may form by one process and get star formation triggered by another. Thus it is often difficult to say how a particular star formed.

There are several correlations that should be expected for star formation that operates in a turbulent gas on a dynamical time scale. First, the mass of the largest cluster should increase with the square of the number of clusters (as observed by Whitmore 2000) because of the size-of-sample effect. Thus regions of active star formation should have not only more clusters but also bigger clusters.

Second, the relative fraction of star formation that occurs in the form of clusters should increase with the total star formation rate (Larsen & Richtler 2000). This is because the total pressure scales approximately with the square of the gas column density in a galaxy, $`P_{ISM}\mathrm{\Sigma }_{gas}^2`$, and the star formation rate scales with this column density approximately as $`\mathrm{SFR}\mathrm{\Sigma }_{gas}^{1.4}`$ (Kennicutt 1998). Thus $`P_{ISM}\mathrm{SFR}^{1.4}`$. In addition, for virialized clusters, the velocity dispersion is $`c^20.2GM/R`$ and the internal pressure is $`P_{int}0.1GM^2/R^4`$. These two equations give a relation between mass and pressure:

$$M6\times 10^3\left(P_{int}/10^8\mathrm{K}\mathrm{cm}^3\right)^{3/2}\left(n/10^5\mathrm{cm}^3\right)^2.$$
(1)
The normalization for this relation comes from the properties of the molecular core near the Trapezium cluster in Orion (Lada, Evans & Falgarone 1997). This mass is the maximum cluster mass since smaller clusters can fragment out. From this we get $`MP_{int}^{3/2}`$ for internal pressure $`P_{int}`$. If the internal pressure scales with the ambient pressure, then the maximum cluster mass $`M_{max}\mathrm{SFR}^2`$.

The Larsen & Richtler (2000) correlation follows from this expression for maximum mass. The total mass of young dense clusters equals the integral of the cluster mass weighted by the mass spectrum from the smallest mass, $`M_{min}`$, to the maximum mass, $`M_{max}`$. For an $`n(M)dM=n_0M^2dM`$ spectrum, the normalization factor $`n_0`$ comes from the integral of $`n(M)dM`$ from $`M_{max}`$ to infinity: $`_{M_{max}}^{\mathrm{}}n_0M^2𝑑M=1`$, which gives $`n_0=M_{max}`$ and $`n(M)dM=M_{max}M^2dM`$. Thus the total cluster mass is $`M_{tot}M_{max}\mathrm{ln}\left(M_{max}/M_{min}\right)`$. The log term is slowly varying, so we get $`M_{tot}M_{max}\mathrm{SFR}^2`$. From this, the fraction of the star formation in the form of dense clusters, $`M_{tot}/\mathrm{SFR}`$, scales directly with the star formation rate:

$$M_{tot}/\mathrm{SFR}\mathrm{SFR}.$$
(2)
This is essentially the relation found by Larsen & Richtler (2000).

A turbulent medium has a distribution of density that is approximately log-normal (Vázquez-Semadeni 1994; Nordlund & Padoan 1999, Klessen 2000; Wada & Norman 2001). Stars form in the densest gas, and this accounts for only a small fraction of the total mass. The rest is at a lower density and is generally faster moving. In the full ISM there are also several temperatures for the gas, and, although much of it is turbulent, only the cool component forms stars. The formation of single or binary stars requires a sufficiently high density in a small region that starlight is excluded, magnetic diffusion is relatively rapid, gravity is relatively strong, and the turbulent motions are subsonic and incompressible. The star formation rate should be approximately the total mass exceeding this density multiplied by the dynamical rate and the efficiency for the collapse process itself. Collapse efficiencies may be several tens of percent once the star formation process starts (Matzner & McKee 2000).

## 3. Summary

The various processes of star formation that are observed in main galaxy disks are also observed in the inner kiloparsec regions where the densities and star formation rates per unit area are much larger. The relative proportion of these processes should change, however, as the ratio of the ambient dynamical time, which is $`\left(G\rho \right)^{1/2}`$ for density $`\rho `$, to the stellar evolution time, which is independent of $`\rho `$, decreases. For high densities, spontaneous gravitational instabilities at the ambient Jeans length and the more local instabilities that occur in turbulence-compressed gas should operate much faster than supernova and stellar wind triggering, which seem to dominate the onset of star formation locally. Not much is known about these relative rates, however. High shear, high extinction, small angular scales, and short time scales make the determination of specific triggers for star formation difficult to determine in the inner kiloparsec.

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text:
# 1 Introduction

## 1 Introduction

Recently, the HERMES collaboration reported the observation of single-spin azimuthal asymmetries for charged and neutral pion production, in semi-inclusive deep inelastic scattering (DIS) of unpolarized positron beam on the longitudinally polarized proton target . Such azimuthal asymmetries are important, because they can provide information of the transversity distributions , which are one of the three fundamental quark distributions of the nucleon. The other two fundamental quark distributions are the momentum and helicity distributions, which have been explored for more than three decades in various DIS processes , and their explicit flavor-dependence has been obtained with relative high precision, although there are still some uncertainties concerning the sea content at small Bjorken variable $`x`$ and the valence flavor-spin structure as $`x1`$. However, the experimental measurements of the quark transversity distributions are just about to begin, since the transversity is not directly observable in inclusive DIS processes. It has been proposed that the transversity can manifest itself through the Collins effect  of nonzero production between a chiral-odd structure function and a T-odd fragmentation function, which is accessible in some specific semi-inclusive hadron production experiments . Indeed, there have been a number of studies  to show that the azimuthal asymmetries measured by HERMES can be used to extract the quark transversity distributions of the nucleon, although the theoretical predictions of the explicit flavor-dependent transversity distributions are different in various models . Therefore the HERMES measurements provide us the opportunity to confront theoretical predictions with physical observations, and it is meaningful to examine the theoretical results carefully, in order to see what conclusion we can draw on the transversity.

The analyzing power of azimuthal spin asymmetry measured by HERMES is defined as

$$A_{UL}^W=\frac{\left[\mathrm{d}\varphi \right]W(\varphi )\left\{N^+(\varphi )N^{}(\varphi )\right\}}{\frac{1}{2}\left[\mathrm{d}\varphi \right]\left\{N^+(\varphi )+N^{}(\varphi )\right\}},$$
(1)
where $`UL`$ denotes unpolarized beam on a longitudinally polarized target, $`W(\varphi )=\mathrm{sin}\varphi `$ or $`\mathrm{sin}2\varphi `$ is the weighting function for picking up the Collins effect, and $`N^+(\varphi )`$ ($`N^{}(\varphi )`$) is the number of events for pion production, as a function of $`\varphi `$, when the target is positively (negatively) polarized. The azimuthal angle $`\varphi `$ is the angle between the pion emitting plane and the lepton scattering plane, with the lepton scattering plane determined by the incident and scattered leptons, and the pion emitting plane determined by the final detected pion and the virtual photon. The virtual photon acts as the common axis of both planes. The analyzing powers of azimuthal asymmetries for charged pions, $`\pi ^+`$ and $`\pi ^{}`$, and neutral pion, $`\pi ^0`$, have been measured , and there is clear evidence for non-zero values of $`A_{UL}^{\mathrm{sin}\varphi }`$ for $`\pi ^+`$ and $`\pi ^0`$ production, which indicates the existence of azimuthal asymmetries. Under a number of simplifying assumptions and approximations, the analyzing power $`A_{UL}^{\mathrm{sin}\varphi }`$ of azimuthal asymmetry is proportional to the ratio

$$\frac{_qe_q^2\delta q(x)H_1^{(1)q}(z)}{_qe_q^2q(x)D_1^q(z)}.$$
(2)
Here $`e_q`$ is the charge of the quark with flavor $`q`$, $`q(x)`$ and $`\delta q(x)`$ are the quark momentum and transversity distributions of the nucleon target, $`D_1^q(z)`$ is the fragmentation function for an unpolarized quark with flavor $`a`$ into a pion $`\pi `$, and $`H_1^{(1)q}(z)`$ is the so called Collins function describing the fragmentation of a transversely polarized quark into a pion $`\pi `$. If one assumes, as adopted in almost all previous analysis, that the pion production is dominated by the “favored” fragmentation processes $`u\pi ^+`$ and $`d\pi ^{}`$ for charged pions, and neglects the “unfavored” processes $`u\pi ^{}`$ and $`d\pi ^+`$, one may conclude that the $`\pi ^+`$ azimuthal asymmetry measures the $`u`$-quark transversity $`\delta u(x)`$ and the $`\pi ^{}`$ azimuthal asymmetry measures the $`d`$-quark transversity $`\delta d(x)`$, respectively. This is the situation of the current available studies.

The purpose of this paper is to take into account the terms neglected in (2), and also to take into consideration the contribution from the “unfavored” fragmentation process. We will estimate their effects on the azimuthal asymmetries for the three kinds of produced pions: $`\pi ^+`$, $`\pi ^{}`$, and $`\pi ^0`$. We find that the neglected terms may have sizable effects on the azimuthal asymmetries in the HERMES kinematical region, and that the results are sensitive to different assumptions on the quark distributions and fragmentation functions. We find also that, although the neglect of the “unfavored” fragmentation processes seems to be reasonable for $`\pi ^+`$ production, it is not justified for $`\pi ^{}`$ production. Moreover, a significant difference between the $`\pi ^{}`$ azimuthal asymmetries predicted by two different models , are largely reduced by taking into account the “unfavored” processes, and this renders it difficult to use $`\pi ^{}`$ production as a clean process to test different predictions on the flavor-spin quark structure of the nucleon at large $`x`$. We will also check the possible ambiguities from the uncertainties in the “unfavored” fragmentation functions. However, it will be shown that the favored fragmentation process in $`\pi ^+`$ production from a neutron target plays a more important role than that in the corresponding $`\pi ^{}`$ production from a proton target. Thus $`\pi ^+`$ production from a neutron target can provide a test of different model predictions. A combination of pion production from both proton and neutron targets can measure both of the $`u`$ and $`d`$ quark transversity distributions, $`\delta u(x)`$ and $`\delta d(x)`$, of the proton.

This paper is organized as follows. In Section II of the paper, we will present the formulae for the azimuthal asymmetries, and analyze in details various assumptions and approximations on the quark distributions and fragmentation functions used for numerical calculations. In section III, we perform numerical calculations of the azimuthal asymmetries for pions: $`\pi ^+`$, $`\pi ^{}`$, and $`\pi ^0`$, and give detailed discussions on the effects of using different approaches to the distribution functions and fragmentation functions. We discuss also in detail the uncertainties coming from the “unfavored” processes of quark to pion fragmentation. In Section IV, we predict the azimuthal asymmetries for pion production in semi-inclusive DIS processes of an unpolarized charged lepton beam on a transversely polarized nucleon target. Finally, we present the summary and conclusions in Section V.

## 2 Formalism of Azimuthal Spin Asymmetry in Pion Electroproduction

Deep inelastic scattering (DIS) of a lepton on a nucleon is one of the most efficient and clean tools to detect the underlying structure of the nucleon. With the recent progress in experimental techniques, the precision detection of hadrons produced in DIS processes makes it possible to reveal more about the basic structure of the nucleon, and the use of polarized beams and/or polarized targets makes it also possible to measure with some precision various polarized quark distributions and fragmentation functions. The HERMES experiments  are performed with an unpolarized lepton beam scattering on a longitudinally polarized proton target, and some assumptions and approximations are needed in order to connect the pion production with the transversity distribution, which is supposed to be related to the probability of finding a quark with its spin aligned to the proton spin for a transversity polarized proton. We first give the formulae for the analyzing power of azimuthal asymmetry and analyze the quantities needed to perform numerical calculations.

### 2.1 Spin asymmetries of pion electroproduction

We now introduce the basic kinematics for semi-inclusive DIS processes. Let $`l_1`$ and $`l_2`$ be the initial and final momenta of the incoming and outgoing charged leptons respectively, $`Q^2=q^2`$ be the squared 4-momentum transfer of the virtual photon with momentum $`q=l_1l_2`$, and $`P`$ and $`P_h`$ ($`M`$ and $`M_h`$) be the target and final hadron momenta (masses). Then the three basic variables, $`x`$, $`y`$, and $`z`$, used in describing DIS processes can be expressed as

$$x=\frac{Q^2}{2Pq};y=\frac{Pq}{Pl_1};z=\frac{PP_h}{Pq},$$
(3)
where $`x`$ is the Bjorken variable which corresponds to the momentum fraction carried by the struck quark in a light-cone description, $`y`$ is the fraction of the initial lepton’s energy transferred to the quark by the virtual photon, and $`z`$ is the fraction of quark momentum transferred to the final produced hadron in the fragmentation process. In the target rest frame, the three variables can be expressed as

$$x=\frac{Q^2}{2M\nu };y=\frac{\nu }{E};z=\frac{E_h}{\nu },$$
(4)
where $`\nu `$, $`E`$, and $`E_h`$ are the virtual photon energy, the incident lepton energy, and the produced hadron energy, respectively. $`s=2Pl=2ME`$ is the total squared energy in the lepton-proton center of mass frame, therefore we have a relation $`Q^2=sxy`$. The incident lepton energy is $`E=27.6`$ GeV in the HERMES experiments. The invariant mass of the photon-proton system is $`W=\sqrt{2M\nu +M^2Q^2}`$. Let $`P_h`$ be the final hadron transverse momentum and $`l_1`$ be the initial lepton transverse momentum, both respect to the virtual photon momentum direction. Then the azimuthal angle $`\varphi `$ is the angle between $`P_h`$ and $`l_1`$ around the virtual photon direction.

Using the above measurable variables of semi-inclusive hadron production and the measurable cross sections, one can defined $`\mathrm{sin}\varphi `$ and $`\mathrm{sin}2\varphi `$ weighted spin asymmetries

$$\frac{|P_h|}{M_h}\mathrm{sin}\varphi =\frac{\mathrm{d}^2P_h\frac{|P_h|}{M_h}\mathrm{sin}\varphi (\mathrm{d}\sigma ^+\mathrm{d}\sigma ^{})}{d^2P_h(\mathrm{d}\sigma ^++\mathrm{d}\sigma ^{})},$$
(5)
$$\frac{|P_h|^2}{MM_h}\mathrm{sin}2\varphi =\frac{\mathrm{d}^2P_{hT}\frac{|P_{hT}|^2}{MM_h}\mathrm{sin}2\varphi (\mathrm{d}\sigma ^+\mathrm{d}\sigma ^{})}{\mathrm{d}^2P_h(\mathrm{d}\sigma ^++\mathrm{d}\sigma ^{})},$$
(6)
which are measurable quantities. Here +(-) denotes parallel (antiparallel) longitudinal polarization of the target. The above asymmetries are related to the azimuthal asymmetries measured by HERMES through the following relations

$$A_{UL}^{\mathrm{sin}\varphi }\frac{2M_h}{P_h}\frac{|P_h|}{M_h}\mathrm{sin}\varphi ,$$
(7)
$$A_{UL}^{\mathrm{sin}2\varphi }\frac{2MM_h}{P_h^2}\frac{|P_h|^2}{MM_h}\mathrm{sin}2\varphi .$$
(8)
In the HERMES experiments, $`P_h=0.44`$ GeV, and we may use $`P_h^2=(0.44)^2`$ GeV2 as an estimate of $`P_h^2`$ in our calculations.

From another side, one can use the quark-parton model to calculate hadron production in semi-inclusive DIS processes, and express the cross sections in terms of various distribution and fragmentation functions. Then one can define the weighted cross section for one flavor quark, $`d\sigma _q`$, with different weighting functions depending on the final hadron transverse momenta $`w_i(P_h)`$:

$$\mathrm{\Sigma }_i^q=\mathrm{d}^2P_hw_i(P_h)d\sigma _q,$$
(9)
where $`w_i(P_h)=1`$, $`w_i(P_h)=P_h\mathrm{sin}\varphi /M_h`$, and $`w_i(P_h)=|P_h|^2\mathrm{sin}2\varphi /MM_h`$. Thus one can relate the theoretical calculations with the above spin asymmetries by

$$\frac{|P_h|}{M_h}\mathrm{sin}\varphi =\frac{\mathrm{\Sigma }_2}{\mathrm{\Sigma }_1},$$
(10)
$$\frac{|P_h|^2}{MM_h}\mathrm{sin}2\varphi =\frac{\mathrm{\Sigma }_3}{\mathrm{\Sigma }_1},$$
(11)
where a sum over all quark flavors, $`\mathrm{\Sigma }_i=_qe_q^2\mathrm{\Sigma }_i^q`$, is implicitly assumed, and will be assumed from now on. In the case of unpolarized beam and longitudinal polarized target, $`\mathrm{\Sigma }_1`$, $`\mathrm{\Sigma }_2=\mathrm{\Sigma }_{2L}+\mathrm{\Sigma }_{2T}`$, and $`\mathrm{\Sigma }_3`$ are given by

$$\mathrm{\Sigma }_1=\left[1+(1y)^2\right]f_1(x)D_1(z),$$
(12)
$$\mathrm{\Sigma }_{2L}=4S_L\frac{M}{Q}(2y)\sqrt{1y}\left[xh_L(x)zH_1^{(1)}(z)h_{1L}^{(1)}(x)\stackrel{~}{H}(z)\right],$$
(13)
$$\mathrm{\Sigma }_{2T}=2S_{Tx}(1y)h_1(x)zH_1^{(1)}(z),$$
(14)
$$\mathrm{\Sigma }_3=8S_L(1y)h_{1L}^{(1)}(x)z^2H_1^{(1)}(z).$$
(15)
Here the components of the longitudinal and transverse target polarization in the virtual photon frame are denoted by $`S_L`$ and $`S_{Tx}`$, respectively:

$$S_L=S\mathrm{cos}\theta _\gamma ,S_{Tx}=S\mathrm{sin}\theta _\gamma ,$$
(16)
with

$$\mathrm{sin}\theta _\gamma =\sqrt{\frac{4M^2x^2}{Q^2+4M^2x^2}\left(1y\frac{M^2x^2y^2}{Q^2}\right)}=\sqrt{\frac{4M^2x}{sy+4M^2x}\left(1y\frac{M^2xy}{s}\right)},$$
(17)
and $`S`$ is the target polarization, which has the value 0.86 in the HERMES experiments. Twist-2 distribution functions and fragmentation functions have a subscribe “1”: $`f_1`$ and $`D_1`$ are the usual unpolarized distribution and fragmentation function, while $`h_{1L}^{(1)}(x)`$ and $`h_1(x)`$ are the quark transverse spin distribution functions of longitudinally and transversely polarized nucleons, respectively. $`h_L(x)`$ is the twist-3 distribution function of a longitudinally polarized nucleon, and it can be split into a twist-2 part, $`h_{1L}^{(1)}(x)`$, and an interaction dependent part, $`\stackrel{~}{h}_L(x)`$:

$$h_L(x)=2\frac{h_{1L}^{(1)}(x)}{x}+\stackrel{~}{h}_L(x).$$
(18)
The fragmentation function $`\stackrel{~}{H}(z)`$ is the interaction dependent part of the twist-3 fragmentation function:

$$H(z)=2zH_1^{(1)}(z)+\stackrel{~}{H}(z).$$
(19)
The functions with superscript “(1)” denote $`p_{}^2`$\- and $`k_{}^2`$-moments, respectively:

$$h_{1L}^{(1)}(x)\mathrm{d}^2p_{}\frac{p_{}^2}{2M^2}h_{1L}^{}(x,p_{}^2),$$
(20)
$$H_{1L}^{(1)}(z)z^2\mathrm{d}^2k_{}\frac{k_{}^2}{2M_h^2}H_{1L}^{}(z,z^2k_{}^2),$$
(21)
where $`p_{}`$ and $`k_{}`$ are the intrinsic transverse momenta of the initial and final partons in the target and produced hadrons, respectively.

To calculate the spin asymmetries and compare them with experiments, we need to know the quark distribution functions: $`f_1(x)`$, $`h_1(x)`$, $`\stackrel{~}{h}_L(x)`$, and $`h_{1L}^{(1)}(x)`$, and the fragmentation functions: $`D_1(z)`$, $`H_1^{(1)}(z)`$, and $`\stackrel{~}{H}(z)`$. Unfortunately, most of the distribution functions and fragmentation functions which appear in these expressions are not known a priori, since they have not been measured yet. Thus we have to make some assumptions and approximations, and this leads to different approaches for the distribution functions and fragmentation functions .

### 2.2 Different approaches to the distribution functions and fragmentation functions

The most simple approach, denoted as Leading Approach, is to neglect the $`1/Q`$ term $`\mathrm{\Sigma }_{2L}`$ in $`\mathrm{\Sigma }_2`$, i.e., we neglect both the $`\stackrel{~}{h}_L(x)`$ and $`h_{1L}^{(1)}(x)`$ terms in the spin asymmetry $`\frac{|P_h|}{M_h}\mathrm{sin}\varphi `$. Then we find immediately that

$$\frac{|P_h|}{M_h}\mathrm{sin}\varphi =\frac{\mathrm{\Sigma }_{2T}}{\mathrm{\Sigma }_1}\frac{h_1(x)H_1^{(1)}(z)}{f_1(x)D_1(z)},$$
(22)
which is Eq. (2). Thus we can relate the quark transversity distribution $`h_1(x)`$ to the spin asymmetry with its $`x`$-dependence. This is the situation discussed in several papers .

The next approach, denoted as Approach 1, is to assume that the twist-2 quark transverse spin distribution function of longitudinally polarized nucleon, $`h_{1L}^{(1)}(x)`$, is zero . Then it follows that

$$h_L(x)=\stackrel{~}{h}_L(x)=h_1(x).$$
(23)
Another approach, denoted as Approach 2, is to assume that the interaction dependent twist-3 part, $`\stackrel{~}{h}_L(x)`$, is zero , and consequently, we can also assume that $`\stackrel{~}{H}(z)`$ is zero. Then by neglecting the term proportional to the current quark mass, one can obtain a Wandzura-Wilczek type relation

$$h_{1L}^{(1)}(x)=x^2_x^1d\xi \frac{h_1(\xi )}{\xi ^2}.$$
(24)
It follows, from Eq. (18), that

$$h_L(x)=2x_x^1d\xi \frac{h_1(\xi )}{\xi ^2}.$$
(25)
In the above two approaches, we only need the distribution functions, $`f_1(x)`$ and $`h_1(x)`$, and the fragmentation functions, $`D_1(z)`$ and $`H_1^{(1)}(z)`$, in order to calculate the spin asymmetries $`\frac{|P_h|}{M_h}\mathrm{sin}\varphi `$ and $`\frac{|P_h|^2}{MM_h}\mathrm{sin}2\varphi `$.

### 2.3 Quark transversity distributions of the nucleon

In the three approaches described above, we need the quark distribution functions, $`f_1(x)=q(x)`$ and $`h_1(x)=\delta q(x)`$, as inputs. The $`x`$-dependence of the spin asymmetries are controlled by the above two quark distribution functions, in which the unpolarized quark distributions $`q(x)`$ are known to relative high precision, thus we are able to extract the information on the quark transversity distributions $`\delta q(x)`$ by comparing theoretical predictions with the experimental data on spin asymmetries.

Although the quark momentum distributions $`q(x)`$ have been measured to high precision, there are still uncertainties concerning the flavor structure as $`x1`$. For example, the SU(6) quark spectator diquark model  predicts $`d(x)/u(x)|_{x=1}=0`$, whereas a pQCD based counting rule analysis  predicts $`d(x)/u(x)|_{x=1}=1/5`$. The flavor structure of the transversity distributions in the two models are also found to differ significantly in this region: the pQCD based analysis predicts  $`\delta d(x)/d(x)1`$, whereas the SU(6) quark-spectator-diquark model predicts  $`\delta d(x)/d(x)1/3`$. Detailed constructions of the quark transversity distributions in the two models can be found in Refs. .

To make realistic predictions of measurable quantities, we need also to take into account the sea quark contribution in the two model constructions. In the quark diquark model case, this can be achieved by adopting one set of unpolarized quark distribution parametrization as input, and then use theoretical relations to connect the quark transversity distributions with the unpolarized quark distributions :

$$\begin{array}{cccc}\delta u_v(x)=[u_v(x)\frac{1}{2}d_v(x)]\widehat{W}_S(x)\frac{1}{6}d_v(x)\widehat{W}_V(x);& & & \\ \delta d_v(x)=\frac{1}{3}d_v(x)\widehat{W}_V(x),& & & \end{array}$$
(26)
in a similar way as was done for the quark helicity distributions . $`\widehat{W}_S(x)`$ and $`\widehat{W}_S(x)`$, which come from the relativistic effect of quark transversal motions , are the Melosh-Wigner rotation factors  for spectator scalar and vector diquarks. We use the valence quark momentum distributions $`u_v(x)`$ and $`d_v(x)`$ from quark distribution parametrization, but with $`\widehat{W}_S(x)`$ and $`\widehat{W}_V(x)`$ from the model calculation . In this way we can take into account the sea contribution for the unpolarized quark distributions through the input parametrization. This can provide a more reliable prediction for the absolute magnitude and shape of a physical quantity than directly from the model calculation.

For the pQCD based analysis, we adopt the same consideration as above and make the following connection to relate the pQCD model quark distributions with the parametrization

$$u_v^{pQCD}(x)=u_v^{para}(x),d_v^{pQCD}(x)=\frac{d_v^{th}(x)}{u_v^{th}(x)}u_v^{para}(x),$$
(27)
$$\delta u_v^{pQCD}(x)=\frac{\delta u_v^{th}(x)}{u_v^{th}(x)}u_v^{para}(x),\delta d_v^{pQCD}(x)=\frac{\delta d_v^{th}(x)}{u_v^{th}(x)}u_v^{para}(x),$$
(28)
where the superscripts “th” means the pure theoretical calculation in the pQCD analysis , and “para” means the input from parametrization. The superscript “pQCD” means that the new quark distributions keep exactly the same flavor and spin structure as that in the pQCD analysis, but with detailed $`x`$-dependent behaviors more closed to the realistic situation. This is equivalent to use an unique correction factor, $`u_v^{para}(x)/u_v^{th}`$, to adjust each pure theoretically calculated quantity to a more realistic pQCD model quantity. In this way we can take into account the sea contribution by using the sea quark distributions from parametrization, while still keep the pQCD model behaviors of the valence quark distributions.

The explicit flavor and transversity structure of the two sets of quark distributions can be found in Fig. 1. Thus we have two sets of quark distributions of $`q(x)`$ and $`\delta q(x)`$, which keeps the same valence behaviors as in the quark diquark model and pQCD based model predictions, but with the sea from parametrization. We expect to make some more realistic predictions based on these two sets of quark distributions, while still can distinguish between the different flavor and spin structure predicted by the two models.

There might be some uncertainties of the magnitude of the explicit quark distributions, however, these uncertainties will be reduced since we will only calculate quantities which involve the ratios of different quark distributions in our later numerical calculations.

### 2.4 Fragmentation functions of pion

We now turn our attention to the fragmentation functions $`D_1(z)`$ and $`H_1^{(1)}(z)`$. $`D_1(z)`$ is the unpolarized fragmentation function for a quark splitting into a pion, and in previous studies on the azimuthal asymmetries, only the favored fragmentation functions, e.g., for a $`u`$ or $`\overline{d}`$ quark into $`\pi ^+`$, are considered. However, a new parametrization of quark to pion fragmentation functions has been proposed , which combines pion production data from both semi-inclusive DIS and $`e^+e^{}`$ processes. This new parametrization provides a complete set of both favored and unfavored fragmentation functions, and therefore it is very useful for the extraction of nucleon structure information from pion production in semi-inclusive DIS processes. In this paper, we will adopt this set of quark to pion fragmentation functions in our analysis of the transversity distributions through the azimuthal spin asymmetries discussed above.

For the favored fragmentation function, we mean the fragmentation function describing the transition of a “valence” quark into the pion, and it is, assuming isospin symmetry,

$$D(z)=D_u^{\pi ^+}(z)=D_{\overline{d}}^{\pi ^+}(z)=D_d^\pi ^{}(z)=D_{\overline{u}}^\pi ^{}(z)$$
(29)
for charged pion fragmentation. The unfavored fragmentation function is supposed to describe the transition of a light-flavor “sea” quark into pions, and it is

$$\widehat{D}(z)=D_{\overline{u}}^{\pi ^+}(z)=D_d^{\pi ^+}(z)=D_{\overline{d}}^\pi ^{}(z)=D_u^\pi ^{}(z)$$
(30)
for $`\pi ^\pm `$ fragmentation. For the case of the neutral pion, assuming that

$$D_q^{\pi ^0}(z)=\frac{1}{2}\left[D_q^{\pi ^+}(z)+D_q^\pi ^{}(z)\right],$$
(31)
we find

$$D^{\pi ^0}(z)=D_u^{\pi ^0}(z)=D_{\overline{u}}^{\pi ^0}(z)=D_d^{\pi ^0}(z)=D_{\overline{d}}^{\pi ^0}(z)=\frac{1}{2}\left[D(z)+\widehat{D}(z)\right].$$
(32)
The explicit analytically forms of $`D(z)`$ and $`\widehat{D}(z)`$ are given by

$$\begin{array}{cc}D(z)=0.689z^{1.039}(1z)^{1.241},\hfill & \\ \widehat{D}(z)=0.217z^{1.805}(1z)^{2.037}.\hfill & \end{array}$$
(33)
From another point of view, assuming the Gribov-Lipatov relation connecting the fragmentation functions and the distribution functions , we have

$$D_q^\pi (z)zq^\pi (z),$$
(34)
where $`q_\pi (z)`$ is the quark distribution of finding a quark $`q`$ with momentum fraction $`x=z`$ in the pion. We also know from the pQCD based analysis  that the $`x1`$ behavior of the quark distribution in the hadron $`h`$ satisfies the counting rule

$$q^h(x)(1x)^{2n_\mathrm{s}1},$$
(35)
where $`n_\mathrm{s}`$ means the spectator quark number. For favored quark fragmentation we notice that

$$D(z)(1z)$$
(36)
because there is only one spectator quark, whereas it is

$$\widehat{D}(z)(1z)^5$$
(37)
for unfavored quark fragmentation because the spectator quark number $`n_\mathrm{s}=3`$ in this case. Thus we may assume

$$\widehat{D}(z)=(1z)^4D(z)$$
(38)
in this extreme situation. To reflect the possible uncertainties in the parametrization of fragmentation functions, we also assume three options for the relation between favored and unfavored fragmentation functions

$$\widehat{D}(z)=(1z)^nD(z),$$
(39)
with $`n=2`$, $`3`$, $`4`$, respectively, to compare with the new parametrization (33) described above.

The so called Collins fragmentation function $`H_1^{(1)}(z)`$, which describes the transition of a transversely polarized quark into a pion, has not been systematically measured yet, and it is also theoretically not well known. However, there has been a so called Collins parametrization  of this fragmentation function, and we will adopt this parametrization in this paper. It is suggested that

$$A_C(z,k_{})=\frac{|k_{}|H_1^q(z,z^2k_{}^2)}{M_hD_1^q(z,z^2k_{}^2)}=\frac{M_C|k_{}|}{M_C^2+|k_{}^2|},$$
(40)
with $`M_C`$ being a typical hadronic scale around $`0.31`$ GeV. Assuming a Gaussian type of the quark transverse momentum dependence in the unpolarized fragmentation function

$$D_1^q(z,z^2k_{}^2)=D_1^q(z)\frac{R^2}{\pi z^2}\mathrm{exp}(R^2k_{}^2),$$
(41)
one obtains

$$H_1^{(1)q}(z)=D_1^q(z)\frac{M_C}{2M_h}\left(1M_C^2R^2_0^{\mathrm{}}dx\frac{\mathrm{exp}(x)}{x+M_C^2R^2}\right),$$
(42)
where $`R^2=z^2/P_h^2`$, and $`P_h^2=z^2k_{}^2`$ is the mean-square momentum the hadron acquires in the quark fragmentation process. We will set the parameters $`M_C=0.7`$ GeV and $`P_h^2=(0.44)^2`$ GeV2 as they are consistent with the spin asymmetry measured at HERMES .

In fact, this fragmentation function controls the $`z`$\- and $`P_h`$-dependence of the azimuthal asymmetries, therefore the $`z`$\- and $`P_h`$-dependence will not be considered in this paper. We will mainly aim at the physics of the transversity distributions, which controls the $`x`$-dependence of the azimuthal asymmetries.

## 3 Numerical Calculations

With the kinematics of semi-inclusive process and the formulae for the azimuthal spin asymmetries of pion production, and also with the quark distribution functions and fragmentation functions given in the above section, we can perform numerical calculations under different assumptions and options. We will compare the numerical calculations of the azimuthal asymmetries with the HERMES experimental data  constrained by the following experimental cuts

$$1<Q^2<15\mathrm{G}eV^2,W>2\mathrm{G}eV,0.2<y<0.85,0.2<z<0.7.$$
(43)
For the $`Q^2`$ and $`W`$ used in the integration over $`y`$ and $`z`$, we use the relations

$$Q^2=sxy,W^2=sy(1x)+M^2,$$
(44)
with $`s=2ME=51.8`$ GeV2 in the HERMES experiments. For the unpolarized quark distributions, we use the CTEQ parametrization  (CTEQ5 set 1) as input for both the quark diquark model and pQCD model quark distribution functions described in the above section.

### 3.1 Different approaches of distribution functions and fragmentation functions

We first check the difference of the azimuthal asymmetries between different approaches of distribution functions and fragmentation functions. In this situation we take into account the contribution from both the favored and unfavored fragmentation functions, i.e., with the new parametrization of both $`D(z)`$ and $`\widehat{D}(z)`$ in Eq. (33) as inputs. The numerical results for Leading Approach, Approach 1, and Approach 2 are given in Fig. 2. We find that both Approach 1 and Approach 2 differ significantly from Leading Approach, and this implies that contribution from the distribution functions $`\stackrel{~}{h}_L(x)`$ and $`h_{1L}^{(1)}(x)`$ are not negligible in the available HERMES experimental region. We also found that the magnitude of the azimuthal asymmetries from Leading Approach is below the data, thus Leading Approach cannot describe the available $`\pi ^+`$ and $`\pi ^0`$ data. However, both Approach 1 and Approach 2 with the two model transversity distributions are consistent with the available data, except for the data point at $`x=0.26`$ for $`\pi ^{}`$ production. But the predictions from Approach 1 and Approach 2 have a large difference at large $`x`$, and we expect that further experimental data at large $`x`$ will be able to distinguish between the two approaches. We can also arrive at a following conclusion: although the HERMES azimuthal asymmetries for longitudinally polarized target  can provide a rough estimate of the quark transversity distributions by comparing theoretical calculations with the experimental data, they do not make a direct measurement of the quark transversity distributions since the contribution from other quark distribution functions might be also sizable.

### 3.2 Different cases of favored and unfavored fragmentation

We next check the contribution from the unfavored fragmentation functions $`\widehat{D}(z)`$. For this purpose we compare the calculations in two cases: with both favored and unfavored fragmentation functions as Case 1, and with only favored fragmentation functions as Case 2. In order to simplify the discussion, we will only perform calculations for Approach 2, and the results are given in Fig. 3. We find that there is almost no difference between the calculated results in the two cases for $`\pi ^+`$ and $`\pi ^0`$ production, and this supports the favored fragmentation dominance assumption for the $`\pi ^+`$ and $`\pi ^0`$ production, as was adopted in the literature. However, the situation is quite different in the two cases for $`\pi ^{}`$ production. This can be seen from Fig. 3 (c) and (f), where the calculated results for the two cases differ significantly. This implies that the unfavored fragmentation functions have a large contribution to $`\pi ^{}`$ production. This can be easily understood, since the most important unfavored process for $`\pi ^{}`$ production is $`u\pi ^{}`$. The big difference between Case 1 and Case 2 shows that the $`u\pi ^{}`$ process is not negligible due to the $`u`$-dominance of the quark distributions in the proton target at large $`x`$.

It is interesting to notice that, although there is clear evidence for the non-zero azimuthal asymmetry for $`\pi ^+`$ and $`\pi ^0`$ production, the available data for $`\pi ^{}`$ production are consistent with no azimuthal asymmetry. The data are consistent with the calculated results with only favored fragmentation functions, i.e., Case 2 . However, the calculated results of Case 1 predict non-zero azimuthal asymmetry for $`\pi ^{}`$ production in both of the quark diquark model and the pQCD based analysis. From Fig. 3 (c) and (f) we find that the data point for $`\pi ^{}`$ production at $`x=0.26`$ seems to be in disagreement with this prediction. We suggest more analysis on $`\pi ^{}`$ production at the $`x>0.2`$ region in order to test this prediction.

We need to examine the possible ambiguities from the uncertainties of the unfavored fragmentation functions. For this purpose we choose the three options of $`\widehat{D}(z)=(1z)^nD(z)`$ with $`n=2,3,4`$, respectively, and present the calculated results in Fig. 4 with cuts $`0.2<z<0.7`$, and in Fig. 5 with cuts $`0.6<z<0.8`$, respectively. For the available data with cuts $`0.2<z<0.7`$, the three different options of the unfavored fragmentation functions do not have big difference, even for $`\pi ^{}`$ production, as shown in Fig. 4. However, for the cuts with higher $`z`$, where the unfavored fragmentation is more suppressed than the favored ones for larger $`n`$, there is a large difference between the calculated results for $`\pi ^{}`$ production with the three options, as shown in Fig. 5. Also there is a big difference between the predictions for $`\pi ^{}`$ production with the two different models of transversity distributions. Therefore the $`\pi ^{}`$ production at large $`x`$ and large $`z`$ is sensitive to the uncertainties of the unfavored fragmentation functions, and this is a region deserving careful experimental studies.

With the contribution from only the favored fragmentation functions considered, it is found  that there is a big difference between the azimuthal asymmetries for $`\pi ^{}`$ production predicted by the quark diquark model and by the pQCD based analysis, as can be seen from the dashed curves in Fig. 3 (c) and (f). However, after taking into account the unfavored fragmentation processes, we find a much reduced difference between the two different model predictions, see the solid curves in Fig. 3 (c) and (f). Thus a clear distinction between the two different predictions will require very high precision measurement in the region with both large $`x`$ and large $`z`$ for the proton target, and this is difficulty to access experimentally. It also reminds us that the $`\pi ^+`$, $`\pi ^0`$, and $`\pi ^{}`$ production from the proton target are mainly controlled by the $`u`$ quark fragmentation, due to the $`u`$ quark dominance in the proton target at large $`x`$. Thus the measured azimuthal asymmetries by the HERMES collaboration  are mainly controlled by the $`u`$ quark transversity distribution $`\delta u(x)`$, and they are not sensitive to the $`d`$ quark transversity distribution $`\delta d(x)`$.

### 3.3 Deuteron and neutron targets

We now consider the possibility to distinguish between different models by using the deuteron as target, where there are equal numbers of $`u`$ and $`d`$ quarks from isopin symmetry. To calculate the azimuthal asymmetries for the deuteron target, we still use the formalism in Sec.II, with the target polarization $`S_D=0.75`$ multiplied by an correction factor

$$\left(1\frac{3}{2}\omega _D\right),$$
(45)
where $`\omega _D=0.05\pm 0.01`$ is the probability of the deuteron to be in the $`D`$-state. The azimutahl asymmetries for $`\pi ^+`$, $`\pi ^0`$, and $`\pi ^{}`$ production are calculated for different approaches of distribution functions and fragmentation functions, and with the quark transversity distributions of the quark diquark model and the pQCD based analysis, respectively. For the unpolarized fragmentation functions, we use the new parametrization Eq. (33), and for the kinematical cuts we use the same as those in the HERMES experiments. The results are given in Fig. 6. From there we find that the deuteron is also not very sensitive to the two different sets of transversity distributions.

We now check whether the situation can be improved if we use the neutron as target. This can be experimentally accessed by measuring the numerators and denominators of the spin asymmetries (10) from proton and deuteron targets respectively, and then extract the numerator and denominator for the neutron contribution to calculate the spin symmetry of the neutron. The calculated results are given in Fig. 7. We find that there is a somewhat bigger difference between the predictions of the quark diquark model and the pQCD based analysis. In order to understand this behavior, we consider the $`\pi ^+`$ production for a neutron target, shown in Fig. 7 (a) and (d), and compare them with the $`\pi ^{}`$ production for a proton target, shown in Fig. 2 (c) and (f). For the proton case, the favored fragmentation process is $`d\pi ^{}`$, while the unfavored process is $`u\pi ^{}`$. The unfavored process is important due to the dominance of $`u`$ quark distribution over $`d`$ inside the proton target at large $`x`$. For the neutron case, the favored fragmentation process is $`u\pi ^+`$, while the unfavored process is $`d\pi ^+`$. The unfavored process is suppressed by a factor of 4 (from the squared charge) compared to the corresponding process of the proton target, while the favored process is enhanced by a factor of 4 compared to the corresponding process of the proton target. Thus the favored process $`u\pi ^+`$ relative to the unfavored process $`d\pi ^+`$ for the neutron target is enhanced by a factor of 16 compared to the corresponding favored process $`d\pi ^{}`$ relative to the unfavored process $`u\pi ^{}`$ for the proton. This implied that the favored process of $`\pi ^+`$ production for the neutron target plays a more important role than the corresponding process of $`\pi ^{}`$ production for the proton target, where the unfavored process is more important and cannot be neglected. Thus we suggest to distinguish between the quark diquark model and the pQCD based analysis by measuring $`\pi ^+`$ production from a neutron target. The $`\pi ^+`$ production for a neutron target is sensitive to the $`u`$ quark transversity distribution of the neutron, which is essentially the $`d`$ quark transversity distribution of the proton. Thus combination of pion production from both the proton and neutron targets can measure the flavor structure of the quark transversity distributions.

### 3.4 The azimuthal asymmetries of $`A_{UL}^{\mathrm{sin}2\varphi }`$

For the azimuthal asymmetries with weighting function $`\mathrm{sin}2\varphi `$, i.e., $`A_{UL}^{\mathrm{sin}2\varphi }`$, there is only one quark distribution function $`h_{1L}^{(1)}(x)`$ involved in the numerator of (11). In both the Leading Approach and Approach 1, this distribution function is assumed to be zero. Therefore the azimuthal asymmetries $`A_{UL}^{\mathrm{sin}2\varphi }`$ can only be calculated in Approach 2, and we present the results for the proton, deuteron, and neutron targets in Figs. 8, 9, and 10, respectively, in the two different models of quark transversity distributions. We find that the magnitude of these asymmetries are not so small in the two models, thus it is possible to measure them with high precision measurements. In the case of a proton target, the calculated results are similar for the two models with the available HERMES kinematical cuts, and they are both compatible with the available HERMES data. The calculated results are also similar in the two models in the case of the deteron target. However, larger differences between the predictions of the two models is found in the case of $`\pi ^+`$ production from a neutron target. Thus precision measurement of $`A_{UL}^{\mathrm{sin}2\varphi }`$ from nucleon targets may provide us with information on the distribution function $`h_{1L}^{(1)}(x)`$ and its flavor structure.

## 4 Prediction of Pion Azimuthal Asymmetries for Transversely Polarized Target

From the above discussions, we find that although the azimuthal asymmetries off longitudinally polarized target may serve as a measurement of the transversity distributions, there are still some contribution from several unmeasured distribution functions and fragmentation functions. Their contribution are not negligible in the HERMES kinematical region, and also there are some ambiguities concerning the size of their contribution from different assumptions, as we can see from the different predictions between Approach 1 and Approach 2 in the last section. Therefore it is necessary to look for more clean processes for a direct measurement of the quark transversity. In fact, it has been known that the azimuthal asymmetries off transversely polarized target are directly connected to the Leading Approach term we discussed for the longitudinally polarized situation. There has been some preliminary results from the SMC experiment , indicating evidence of non-zero azimuthal asymmetry for pion production from a transversely polarized target. Also the HERMES collaboration is planning to measure the azimuthal asymmetries of pion production from transversely polarized targets in the near future . It is thus necessary to make clear predictions on the quantities they will measure by using the two sets of transversity distributions given by the quark diquark model and the pQCD based analysis.

More specifically, for an unpolarized lepton beam and a transversely polarized target, the following weighted asymmetry provides access to the quark transversity distribution

$$A_T(x,y,z)=\frac{d\varphi ^l\mathrm{d}^2P_h\frac{|P_h|}{zM_h}\mathrm{sin}(\varphi _s^l+\varphi _h^l)\left(\mathrm{d}\sigma ^{}\mathrm{d}\sigma ^{}\right)}{d\varphi ^l\mathrm{d}^2P_h\left(\mathrm{d}\sigma ^{}+\mathrm{d}\sigma ^{}\right)},$$
(46)
where $``$ ($``$) denotes target up (down) transverse polarization. The azimuthal angles are defined in the transverse space giving the orientation of the lepton plane ($`\varphi ^l`$) and the orientation of the hadron plane ($`\varphi _h^l=\varphi _h\varphi ^l`$) or spin vector ($`\varphi _s^l=\varphi _s\varphi ^l`$) with respect to the lepton plane. The asymmetry (46) can be calculated from the distribution functions and fragmentation functions by

$$A_T(x,y,z)=S_T\frac{(1y)_qe_q^2\delta q(x)H_1^{(1)q}(z)}{(1y+y^2/2)_qe_q^2q(x)D_1^q(z)},$$
(47)
where $`S_T`$ is the target polarization. Assuming $`S_T=0.75`$ and the same kinematical cuts as in the MERMES experiments, and with all of the quantities discussed as before, we can calculate the asymmetry $`A_T`$ with the two different sets of quark transversity distributions. The integration over $`y`$ and $`z`$ should be performed for both the numerator and denominator. The predictions for a proton target are given in Fig.11, from where we notice that the azimuthal asymmetries of $`\pi ^+`$, $`\pi ^0`$, and $`\pi ^{}`$ production from a proton target are mainly controlled by the $`u`$ quark transversity distribution, and they can serve to measure $`\delta u(x)`$. The predictions for pion production from a deuteron target, given in Fig. 12, are also found to have small differences between the two different models. However, the azimuthal asymmetries from a neutron target are predicted to have a large difference between the quark diquark model and the pQCD based analysis, as shown in Fig. 13. Thus they can serve to measure the flavor structure of quark transversity distributions, i.e., one can measure both $`\delta u(x)`$ and $`\delta d(x)`$ by using the azimuthal asymmetries from both proton and neutron targets.

## 5 Summary and Conclusions

In this paper, we analyzed in detail the azimuthal spin asymmetries of pion production, in semi-inclusive deep-inelastic scattering of unpolarized charged lepton beams on longitudinally and transversely polarized nucleon targets. Various assumptions and approximations of the distribution functions and fragmentation functions were examined. It was found that different approaches of distribution functions and fragmentation functions lead to different predictions of the azimuthal asymmetries in the available HERMES kinematical region. This means that the effects from unknown distribution functions may have sizable effects on the azimuthal asymmetries of the HERMES experiments, thus one needs to consider them before attributing the HERMES data as a measurement of transversity distributions. We also found that the predictions of $`\pi ^{}`$ production from the proton target are quite different for two cases of both favored and unfavored fragmentation, and of only favored fragmentation. This means that the unfavored fragmentation functions play an important role for $`\pi ^{}`$ production from a proton target, due to the dominance of $`u`$ quarks inside the proton target, thus the unfavored $`u\pi ^{}`$ fragmentation are not negligible. This point was not considered in the available studies of azimuthal asymmetries. The pion production from the proton target is most suitable to study the $`u`$ quark transversity distribution. In combination with the pion production from a neutron target, it is possible to measure both of the $`u`$ and $`d`$ quark transversity distributions. Thus we suggest to measure the azimuthal symmetries of pion production from the neutron target, in order to test different model predictions. Predictions of azimuthal asymmetries of pion production in semi-inclusive deep-inelastic scattering of unpolarized charged lepton beams on transversely polarized nucleon targets are also given, and different predictions between two different models are given for pion production from a neutron target. This study will be useful for designing experiments aiming at measuring transversity distributions through pion production in semi-inclusive deep-inelastic scattering of unpolarized beams on longitudinally and transversely polarized targets. It is also useful for theoretical studies aiming at extracting transversity distributions from experimental observation of azimuthal asymmetries of pion production in semi-inclusive deep-inelastic scattering.

Acknowledgments:  This work is partially supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China under Grant Numbers 19975052, 19875024, and 10025523, by Fondecyt (Chile) postdoctoral fellowship 3990048, and by Fondecyt (Chile) grant 8000017.