Inclusive electroproduction of pseudo-scalar mesons on a proton: Selection of the strange-quark contribution to the proton spin

Abstract

In this work, the problem of separating the contribution of a strange quark to the proton spin in the process$ep \to e' Mx = (M = K^ \pm ,K^0 ,\bar K^0 ,\pi ^ \pm )$ is studied. Measurements of the quantities Δσ _K and Δσ_±, where Δσ _M =dσ _M (+ +) -dσ _M (+ -) at small z, and the use of definite combinations of them allow important information on the proton-spin structure to be obtained.