Gluon shadowing in nuclei and the role of the $c \bar c g$ state in the coherent photoproduction of $J/\psi$ in nucleus-nucleus collisions

Abstract

In this brief note, we confront our results on diffractive photoproduction of $J/\psi$ mesons with the putative gluon shadowing ratio defined as $R_g= \sqrt{\sigma(\gamma A \to J/\psi A)/\sigma_{\rm IA.}}$, where $\sigma_{\rm IA}$ is the result in impulse approximation. Building on our earlier description of the process in the color-dipole approach, where we took into account the rescattering of $c \bar c$ states only, we demonstrate that the inclusion of $c \bar c g$-Fock states improves the description at small $x$ commonly associated with gluon shadowing.