Strangeness in the proton from $W^+$ charm production and SIDIS data

6 May 2026, 10:20
10m
Sala IMPERIALE A, First Floor (Hotel Carlton)

Sala IMPERIALE A, First Floor

Hotel Carlton

Flash talk WG1 Structure Functions and Parton Densities WG1 Structure functions and parton densities

Speaker

Wally Melnitchouk (Jefferson Lab)

Description

We perform a global QCD analysis of unpolarized PDFs in the proton, including new $W+$charm production data from $pp$ collisions at the LHC and semi-inclusive pion and kaon production data in lepton-nucleon DIS, both of which have been suggested for constraining the strange quark PDF. Compared with a baseline global fit that does not include these datasets, the new analysis reduces the uncertainty on the strange quark distribution over the range $0.01 < x < 0.3$, and provides a consistent description of processes sensitive to strangeness in the proton. The data place more stringent constraints on the strange asymmetry $s − \bar{s}$, which is found to be consistent with zero in this range.

Speaker confirmation Yes

Authors

Nobuo Sato (Jefferson Lab) Trey Anderson (William and Mary) Wally Melnitchouk (Jefferson Lab)

Presentation materials