Gluon propagation inside a high-energy nucleus

Abstract

We show that, in the light-cone gauge, it is possible to derive in a very simple way the solution of the classical Yang-Mills equations for the collision between a nucleus and a proton. One important step of the calculation is the derivation of a formula that describes the propagation of a gluon in the background color field of the nucleus. This allows us to calculate observables in pA collisions in a more straightforward fashion than already proposed. We discuss also the comparison between light-cone gauge and covariant gauge in view of further investigations involving higher order corrections.