Higher twist effects in charmed-strange $\nu$DIS diffraction

Abstract

The non-conservation of charmed-strange current in the neutrino deep inelastic scattering ($\nu$DIS) strongly affects the longitudinal structure function, $F_L$, at small values of Bjorken $x$. The corresponding correction to $F_L$ is a higher twist effect enhanced at small-$x$ by the rapidly growing gluon density factor. As a result, the component of $F_L$ induced by the charmed-strange current prevails over the light-quark component and dominates $F_L=F_L^{cs}+F_L^{ud}$ at $x\lsim 0.01$ and $Q^2\sim m_c^2$. The color dipole analysis clarifies the physics behind the phenomenon and provides a quantitative estimate of the effect.