Hadron Transverse Momentum Distributions in Muon Deep Inelastic Scattering at 160 GeV/$c$

Abstract

Multiplicities of charged hadrons produced in deep inelastic muon scattering off a ${}^6$LiD target have been measured as a function of the DIS variables $x_{Bj}$, $Q^2$, $W^2$ and the final state hadron variables $p_T$ and $z$. The $p_T^2$ distributions are fitted with a single exponential function at low values of $p_T^2$ to determine the dependence of $⟨p_T^2⟩$ on $x_{Bj}$, $Q^2$, $W^2$ and $z$. The $z$-dependence of $⟨p_T^2⟩$ is shown to be a potential tool to extract the average intrinsic transverse momentum squared of partons, $⟨k_{\perp }^2⟩$, as a function of $x_{Bj}$ and $Q^2$ in a leading order QCD parton model.

18 pages, 13 figures and 3 tables