Azimuthal asymmetries in semi-inclusive leptoproduction

Abstract

We point out the role of intrinsic transverse momentum of partons in the study of azimuthal asymmetries in deep-inelastic 1-particle inclusive leptoproduction. Leading asymmetries often appear in combination with spin asymmetries. This leads not only to transverse momentum dependence in the parton distribution functions, but also to functions beyond the ones known from inclusive deep-inelastic scattering (DIS). We use Lorentz invariance and the QCD equations of motion to study the evolution of functions that appear at leading (zeroth) order in a 1/Q expansion in azimuthal asymmetries. This includes the evolution equation of the Collins fragmentation function. The moments of these functions are matrix elements of known twist two and twist three operators. We give the evolution in the large $N_c$ limit, restricted to the non-singlet case for the chiral-even functions.