Precision measurements of electron-proton elastic scattering cross sections at large Q²
Name
1133651697-MIT.pdf
Size
21.26 MB
Format
Adobe PDF
Checksum (MD5)
ed92eb3cabedd25da0ad0335577f0dfb
Author(s)
Ou, Longwu
Advisor(s)
Or Hen and Shalev Gilad.
Date Issued
2019
Publisher
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Abstract
The electromagnetic form factors are fundamental quantities characterizing the internal structure of the nucleon. Their measurements have provided significant insight into the spatial distribution and interaction of quarks inside the proton. The knowledge of high Q2 form factors proves essential in understanding the properties of quantum chromodynamics in the transition region from non-perturbative to perturbative behavior. It also provides important links to generalized parton distributions, which describe the three-dimensional structure of hadrons at the parton level. In view of the significant theoretical research activities in this field, high quality experimental data are crucial for providing stringent tests and benchmarks to guide and test different models. The form factors can be accessed in experiments by measuring elastic scattering of electrons off a hydrogen target. Experiment E12-07-108, which took place at the Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility, conducted precise measurements of the unpolarized e-p elastic scattering cross section over a Q2 range of 0.6-16.5 GeV2 . This thesis presents the results for 7 kinematic settings with total uncertainties that are 1.5 times smaller than those of the existing data at large Q2 . The proton magnetic form factors were extracted using a parameterization of the form factor ratio obtained from recent polarized e-p scattering experiments. Comparisons to existing global and phenomenological fits are presented.
Description
Thesis: Ph. D., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Department of Physics, 2019
Cataloged from PDF version of thesis.
Includes bibliographical references (pages 185-192).
Subjects
Physics.
MIT Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Physics
Terms of Use
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