Collins effect and single spin azimuthal asymmetries in the HERMES and COMPASS experiments

Abstract

Predictions are made for single spin azimuthal asymmetries due to the Collins effect in pion production from semi-inclusive deeply inelastic scattering off transversely and longitudinally polarized targets for the HERMES and COMPASS experiments. The x-dependence of the asymmetries is evaluated using the parton distribution functions from the chiral quark-soliton model. The overall normalization of the predicted asymmetries is determined by the information on the Collins fragmentation function extracted from previous HERMES data on azimuthal asymmetries from a longitudinally polarized target. The single spin asymmetries from the transversely polarized proton target are found to be about 20% for positive and neutral pions both at HERMES and COMPASS. For a longitudinally polarized target we obtain for COMPASS a sin(phi) asymmetry of 1% and a sin(2phi) asymmetry of about 3%.