A Bound on the Energy Loss of Partons in Nuclei

Abstract

We derive a quantum mechanical upper bound on the amount of radiative energy loss suffered by high energy quarks and gluons in nuclear matter. The bound shows that the nuclear suppression observed in quarkonium production at high $x_F$ cannot be explained in terms of energy loss of the initial or final parton states. We also argue that no nuclear suppression is expected in the photoproduction of light hadrons at large $x_F$.