# HYPERON POLARIZATION AND SINGLE SPIN ASYMMETRIES IN DIFFERENT HADRONIC REACTIONS 11footnote 1Supported in part by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC)

## Abstract

We show that the polarization of hyperons observed in high energy collisions using unpolarized hadron beams and unpolarized nucleon or nuclear targets is closely related to the left-right asymmetries observed in single spin inclusive hadron production processes. The relationship is most obvious for the production of the hyperons which have only one common valence quark with the projectile. Further implications of the existence of large polarization for hyperon which has two valence quarks in common with the projectile and their consequences are discussed. A comparison with the available data is made. Further tests are suggested.

This talk is a summary of the basic ideas and main results of Refs.\[1-3\] which have been done in collaboration with C. Boros. In these papers, we show that there should be a close relation between hyperon polarization $`(P_H)`$ and single-spin left-right asymmetry $`(A_N)`$ observed in hadron-hadron collisions at high energies. We pointed out that following simple observations and/or arguments seem already suggest this should be true: First, the data  for $`P_H`$ and those for $`A_N`$ show exactly the same characteristics. Second, both effects show the existence of a correlation between transverse motion and transverse polarization. Hence, unless the polarization of the produced hyperons in the projectile fragmentation region (denoted by PFR in the following) is completely independent of that of the projectile we are practically forced to accept that $`A_N`$ and $`P_H`$ are closely related to each other.

For explicity, we considered the questions: Can we understand the existence of $`P_H`$ and reproduce the main feature of the data if we use $`A_N`$ as input? Do we need further input(s)? We noted in particular the following:

(I) The $`A_N`$ data show that meson containing $`q_v`$ and a suitable anti-sea-quark $`\overline{q}_s`$ has a large probability to go left if $`q_v`$ is upwards polarized. (We denote the difference of the probability for such a meson to go left and that to go right by $`C`$.\] We assume that this is also true for the produced baryon which contains such a $`q_v`$ and a sea diquark.

(II) Recent measurements  of $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ polarization from $`Z^0`$ decay show that, in the longitudinally polarized case, quark polarization remains the same before and after the hadronization. We assume that this is true not only for $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ but also for other hyperons and also in the transversely polarized case.

We first considered the production of hyperon $`(H)`$ which has only one valence quark in common with the projectile $`P`$. In this case, the PFR is dominated by the hadronization product that contains this common valence quark, and the polarization of such $`H`$ is determined completely by the points (I) and (II) mentioned above. E.g., $`p+p\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}+X`$, the common valence quark is $`d_v`$ and, according to (I), $`d_v`$ should have a large probability to be upwards polarized, if $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}`$ is going left. Together with the wavefunction of $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}`$, this implies that the produced $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}`$ has a probability of $`5/6(1/6)C`$ to be upwards (downwards) polarized, i.e. $`P_H=(2/3)C`$ for such $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}`$. Similarly, we obtain $`P_H=(1/3)C`$ for such $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}`$ or $`\mathrm{\Xi }^0`$ in $`pp`$-collisions; and so on. Since such $`H`$’s dominate only at large $`x_F`$, we expect that the magnitudes of $`P_H`$ increase with increasing $`x_F`$ and the above mentioned results are their limits at $`x_F1`$. All these are consistent with the data . Furthermore, without any other input, we obtained, e.g.: (A) $`P_\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ in the PFR of $`K^{}+p\mathrm{\Lambda }+X`$ is large and is, in contrast to that in $`pp`$-collisions, positive in sign. (B) $`P_\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ in the PFR of $`\pi ^\pm +p\mathrm{\Lambda }+X`$ should be negative and the magnitude should be very small. (C) Not only hyperons but also the produced vector mesons are expected to be transversely polarized in the fragmentation region of hadron-hadron collisions. (D) Neither the contribution from hadronization to $`P_\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ nor that to $`A_N`$ can be large. Presently, there are already data available for (A) and (B) , and they are in agreement with these associations. (D) is consistent with the results  of the recent SLD measurements of jet handedness at SLAC, which show that the spin dependence of hadronization is very little. (C) can be checked by future experiments.

In the second case, we considered the production of hyperon which has two valence quarks in common with the projectile and hence hyperons containing such common valence diquarks dominate the PFR. E.g., $`p+p\mathrm{\Lambda }+X`$. We started  again from $`A_N`$ for $`p()+p\mathrm{\Lambda }+X`$ and recall that a significant $`A_N`$ has been observed  in the PFR. This result was rather surprising since, according to the wavefunction of $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$, the common valence diquark $`(u_vd_v)`$ here has to be in the spin zero state thus cannot transfer the information of polarization to the produced $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$. An explanation is given in . It has been pointed out  that, the production of the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ containing the spin-0 $`(u_vd_v)`$ and a $`s_s`$ is associated with the production of a $`K`$ containing the remaining $`u_v^a`$ of $`P`$ and the $`\overline{s}_s`$. The information of polarization is carried by the $`u_v^a`$ so that, according to (I), the produced $`K`$ has a large probability to go left if $`P`$ is upwards polarized. The $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ has therefore a large probability to go right since the transverse momentum should be compensated. In this way, the $`A_N`$ data  has been reproduced. According to this, in unpolarized $`pp`$-collision, if the produced $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ is moving to the left, the associated $`K`$ should mainly move to the right. Hence, according to (I), the $`u_v^a`$ contained in this $`K`$ should have a large probability to be downwards polarized. Since $`K`$ has spin 0, the $`\overline{s}_s`$ should be upwards polarized. Hence, to get a negative $`P_\mathrm{\Lambda }`$, we need only to assume that the sea quark-antiquark pair $`s_s\overline{s}_s`$ have opposite transverse spins. Under this assumption, the polarization of such $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ is completely determined by that of the remaining $`u_v^a`$. To test this, we did: First, we made a similar analysis for other hyperons. The obtained $`P_H`$’s are all consistent with the available data . Second, we made a quantitative estimation of $`P_\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ in $`p+p\mathrm{\Lambda }+X`$ as a function of $`x_F`$. By taking the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$’s containing two, one or zero valence quark(s) of $`P`$ into account, we obtained the result shown in Fig.1. Third, we derived a number of other consequences without any further input. E.g.: ($`\alpha `$) The spin transfer $`D_{NN}`$ in the PFR of $`p()+p\mathrm{\Lambda }+X`$ should be positive and large for large $`x_F`$. ($`\beta `$) $`P_\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ in the PFR of $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}+A\mathrm{\Lambda }+X`$ should be negative and much less significant than that in $`p+p\mathrm{\Lambda }+X`$. ($`\gamma `$) Hyperon polarization in processes in which a vector meson is associatively produced should be very much different from that in processes in which a pseudoscalar meson is associatively produced. Presently, there are data available for the processes mentioned in ($`\alpha `$) and ($`\beta `$) , and they are in agreement with the above expectations. ($`\gamma `$) is another characteristic feature of the model and can be used as a crisp test of the picture.

|  | Fig.1: Calculated results for the polarization of $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$, $`P_\mathrm{\Lambda }`$, as a function of $`x_F`$ compared with the data . See Ref. for more detail. |
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