# 1 Introduction and General Framework

## 1 Introduction and General Framework

Previous studies  have exposed the photoproduction of (di-)jets in longitudinally polarized $`ep`$ collisions at HERA as a very promising and feasible tool to measure the parton densities of circularly polarized photons in ‘resolved’-photon processes. It should be stressed that these photonic parton distributions, defined as

$$\mathrm{\Delta }f^\gamma (x,Q^2)f_+^{\gamma _+}(x,Q^2)f_{}^{\gamma _+}(x,Q^2),$$
(1)   
where $`f_+^{\gamma _+}`$ $`(f_{}^{\gamma _+})`$ denotes the density of a parton $`f`$ with helicity ‘+’ (‘$``$’) in a photon with helicity ‘+’, are completely unmeasured so far. The $`\mathrm{\Delta }f^\gamma `$ contain information different from that included in the unpolarized $`f^\gamma `$ \[defined by taking the sum in (1)\], and their measurement is indispensable for a thorough understanding of the partonic structure of the photon. As in  we will exploit the predictions of two very different models for the $`\mathrm{\Delta }f^\gamma `$ , and study the sensitivity of di-jet production to these unknown quantities. In the first case (‘maximal scenario’) we saturate the positivity bound $`|\mathrm{\Delta }f^\gamma (x,Q^2)|f^\gamma (x,Q^2)`$ at a low input scale $`\mu 0.6\mathrm{GeV}`$, using the unpolarized GRV densities $`f^\gamma `$ . The other extreme input (‘minimal scenario’) is defined by a vanishing hadronic input at the same scale $`\mu `$. We limit ourselves to leading order (LO) QCD, which is entirely sufficient for our purposes; however both scenarios can be straightforwardly extended to the next-to-leading order (NLO) of QCD .

The generic expression for polarized photoproduction of two jets with laboratory system rapidities $`\eta _1`$, $`\eta _2`$ reads in LO

$$\frac{d^3\mathrm{\Delta }\sigma }{dp_Td\eta _1d\eta _2}=2p_T\underset{f^e,f^p}{}x_e\mathrm{\Delta }f^e(x_e,\mu _f^2)x_p\mathrm{\Delta }f^p(x_p,\mu _f^2)\frac{d\mathrm{\Delta }\widehat{\sigma }}{d\widehat{t}},$$
(2)   
where $`p_T`$ is the transverse momentum of one of the two jets (which balance each other in LO), $`x_ep_T/(2E_e)\left(e^{\eta _1}+e^{\eta _2}\right)`$, and $`x_pp_T/(2E_p)\left(e^{\eta _1}+e^{\eta _2}\right)`$. The $`\mathrm{\Delta }f^p`$ in (2) denote the spin-dependent parton densities of the proton, and<sup>1</sup><sup>1</sup>1The direct (‘unresolved’) photon contribution to (2) is obtained by setting $`\mathrm{\Delta }f^\gamma (x_\gamma ,\mu _f^2)\delta (1x_\gamma )`$ in (3).

$$\mathrm{\Delta }f^e(x_e,\mu _f^2)=_{x_e}^1\frac{dy}{y}\mathrm{\Delta }P_{\gamma /e}(y)\mathrm{\Delta }f^\gamma (x_\gamma =\frac{x_e}{y},\mu _f^2),$$
(3)   
where $`\mathrm{\Delta }P_{\gamma /e}`$ is the polarized ‘equivalent-photon’ spectrum for which we will use<sup>2</sup><sup>2</sup>2Very recently the non-logarithmic corrections to (4) have been calculated in . They typically lead to an $`𝒪(10\%)`$ correction which, however, cancels to a large extent in the experimentally relevant spin asymmetry $`\mathrm{\Delta }\sigma /\sigma `$, and thus can be safely neglected here.

$$\mathrm{\Delta }P_{\gamma /e}(y)=\frac{\alpha _{em}}{2\pi }\left[\frac{1(1y)^2}{y}\right]\mathrm{ln}\frac{Q_{\mathrm{max}}^2(1y)}{m_e^2y^2},$$
(4)   
with the electron mass $`m_e`$ and $`Q_{\mathrm{max}}^2=4\mathrm{GeV}^2`$. Needless to say that the unpolarized LO jet cross section $`d^3\sigma `$ is obtained by using the corresponding unpolarized quantities in (2)-(4). The appropriate LO $`22`$ partonic cross sections $`d(\mathrm{\Delta })\widehat{\sigma }`$ in (2) for the direct $`(\gamma bcd)`$ and resolved $`(abcd)`$ cases can be found, for instance, in .

The key feature of di-jet production is that a measurement of both jet rapidities allows for fully reconstructing the kinematics of the underlying hard subprocess and thus for determining the variable  $`x_\gamma ^{\mathrm{OBS}}=_{jets}p_T^{jet}e^{\eta ^{jet}}/(2yE_e)`$, which to LO equals $`x_\gamma =x_e/y`$, with $`y`$ being the fraction of the electron’s energy taken by the photon. In this way it becomes possible to experimentally suppress the direct contribution by introducing some suitable cut<sup>3</sup><sup>3</sup>3To achieve a similar ‘separation’ for single-inclusive jet production one has to ‘look’ into different rapidity directions since the direct (resolved) contribution dominates in the electron (proton) direction . $`x_\gamma ^{\mathrm{OBS}}0.75`$ , or by scanning different $`x_\gamma ^{\mathrm{OBS}}`$ bins. In  the usefulness of this method was demonstrated also for the polarized case. In addition it was shown  that the LO QCD parton level calculations nicely agree with ‘real’ jet production processes including initial and final state QCD radiation as well as non-perturbative effects such as hadronization, as modeled using the SPHINX Monte-Carlo . These results were all very encouraging; however it was not studied how one can actually unfold the $`\mathrm{\Delta }f^\gamma `$ from such a measurement. This question will be addressed here. In this context the concept of ‘effective parton densities’, developed many years ago  and recently revived , proves to be a useful tool. We will first recall the basic idea behind this approximation and subsequently discuss its extension to the spin-dependent case.

## 2 ‘Effective’ Parton Densities Revisited

Obviously it would be a very involved task to unfold the $`\mathrm{\Delta }f^\gamma `$ from a jet-measurement since many subprocesses and combinations of parton densities contribute to the cross section (2). Some handy but still accurate approximation for (2) is certainly required to facilitate this job.

In the unpolarized case a useful approximation procedure was developed in . It was observed that the ratios of the dominant, properly symmetrized, LO subprocesses are roughly independent of the c.m.s partonic scattering angle $`\mathrm{\Theta }`$ and, most importantly, that for $`\mathrm{cos}\mathrm{\Theta }=\pm 1`$ all ratios tend to the same value determined by the color factors $`C_A`$ and $`C_F`$:

$$\frac{\widehat{\sigma }_{qq^{}}}{\widehat{\sigma }_{qg}}|_{\mathrm{cos}\mathrm{\Theta }=\pm 1}=\frac{\widehat{\sigma }_{qq}}{\widehat{\sigma }_{qg}}|_{\mathrm{cos}\mathrm{\Theta }=\pm 1}=\frac{\widehat{\sigma }_{qg}}{\widehat{\sigma }_{gg}}|_{\mathrm{cos}\mathrm{\Theta }=\pm 1}=\frac{C_F}{C_A}=\frac{4}{9}.$$
(5)   
Making use of (5) for all values of $`\mathrm{\Theta }`$ and introducing the ‘effective’ parton density combinations

$$f_{\mathrm{eff}}^{(p,\gamma )}\underset{q}{}[q^{(p,\gamma )}+\overline{q}^{(p,\gamma )}]+\frac{9}{4}g^{(p,\gamma )},$$
(6)   
the jet cross section factorizes into these densities times a single subprocess cross section (cf. Eq. (9) below). The ratios of the parton cross sections are depicted in Fig. 1, and, although they considerably deviate from $`4/9`$ for $`\mathrm{cos}\mathrm{\Theta }\pm 1`$, the approximation works amazingly well at a level of about $`𝒪(10\%)`$ accuracy.

Unfortunately this approximation has no straightforward extension to the spin-dependent case as is obvious from Fig. 1. The ratios of the LO polarized subprocess cross sections obey

$$\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }\widehat{\sigma }_{qq^{}}}{\mathrm{\Delta }\widehat{\sigma }_{qg}}|_{\mathrm{cos}\mathrm{\Theta }=\pm 1}=\frac{4}{11},\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }\widehat{\sigma }_{qq}}{\mathrm{\Delta }\widehat{\sigma }_{qg}}|_{\mathrm{cos}\mathrm{\Theta }=\pm 1}=\frac{8}{33},\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }\widehat{\sigma }_{qg}}{\mathrm{\Delta }\widehat{\sigma }_{gg}}|_{\mathrm{cos}\mathrm{\Theta }=\pm 1}=\frac{22}{81}$$
(7)   
rather than approaching a common value for $`\mathrm{cos}\mathrm{\Theta }=\pm 1`$, and, consequently, the factorization as outlined above is bound to fail. However, one also notices that all spin-dependent ratios in Fig. 1 are more flattish w.r.t $`\mathrm{cos}\mathrm{\Theta }`$ than in the unpolarized case, and $`qq^{}/qg=4/11`$ is exact for all values of $`\mathrm{cos}\mathrm{\Theta }`$. It turns out that by approximating all ratios by $`4/11`$ and introducing

$$\mathrm{\Delta }f_{\mathrm{eff}}^{(p,\gamma )}\underset{q}{}[\mathrm{\Delta }q^{(p,\gamma )}+\mathrm{\Delta }\overline{q}^{(p,\gamma )}]+\frac{11}{4}\mathrm{\Delta }g^{(p,\gamma )},$$
(8)   
the effective parton density approximation works remarkably well also in this case, and (2) factorizes, e.g., for the resolved contribution, schematically into

$$d\mathrm{\Delta }\sigma ^{2\mathrm{jet}}\mathrm{\Delta }f_{\mathrm{eff}}^\gamma \mathrm{\Delta }f_{\mathrm{eff}}^p𝑑\mathrm{\Delta }\widehat{\sigma }_{qq^{}qq^{}}.$$
(9)   
For all relevant purposes the approximated and the exact polarized LO di-jet cross sections agree within $`5\%`$, even better than what is achieved in the unpolarized case. Figure 2 shows the polarized effective photon density according to (8) for the two extreme scenarios specified above at a scale relevant for the production of jets with $`p_T`$ values of about $`510\mathrm{GeV}`$.

## 3 Results and Conclusions

Figure 3 shows the experimentally relevant di-jet spin asymmetry $`A^{2\mathrm{jet}}d\mathrm{\Delta }\sigma /d\sigma `$, for three different bins in $`x_\gamma `$, using similar cuts as in : the difference of the jet pseudorapidities is required to be $`|\mathrm{\Delta }\eta ^{\mathrm{jets}}|<1`$, for the average rapidity we demand $`0<(\eta _1+\eta _2)/2<1`$, and $`0.2<y<0.83`$. The factorization scale $`\mu _F`$ in (2) was chosen to be equal to $`p_T`$, but the asymmetry is largely independent of that choice. Very recently, the complete NLO QCD corrections to polarized jet-(photo)production have become available . They lead to an improved scale dependence of the cross sections. Moderate NLO corrections for the asymmetry were found for the single-inclusive case ; similar results should be expected also for di-jet production.

As can be inferred from Fig. 3, the effective parton density approximation works very well. It is only for $`0.4x_\gamma 0.75`$ and large $`p_T`$ that the deviations from the exact results become more pronounced.

Also shown in Fig. 3 is the expected statistical accuracy for such measurements, assuming three bins in $`p_T`$ for each $`x_\gamma `$ bin, an integrated luminosity of $`200\mathrm{pb}^1`$, and $`70\%`$ beam polarizations. Given these error bars the prospects for distinguishing between different scenarios for $`\mathrm{\Delta }f_{\mathrm{eff}}^\gamma `$ are rather promising provided the proton densities $`\mathrm{\Delta }f_{\mathrm{eff}}^p`$, also entering (9), are known fairly well, which is clearly not the case yet. However, our ignorance of the $`\mathrm{\Delta }f^p`$ will be vastly reduced by the upcoming polarized $`pp`$ collider RHIC and ongoing efforts in the fixed target sector by HERMES and (soon) by COMPASS. It should be kept in mind that so far nothing at all is known about the $`\mathrm{\Delta }f^\gamma `$, and even to establish the very existence of a resolved component also in the spin-dependent case would be an important step forward.