Vector-Meson Dominance and High-Energy Electron-Proton Inelastic Scattering

Abstract

A vector-meson dominance model for high-energy $\mathrm{ep}$ inelastic scattering is proposed. We predict that at high values of the missing mass (>2.5 BeV) the ratio of the longitudinal to the transverse cross section is given by $\ensuremath{\xi}(\frac{{q}^{2}}{m_{\ensuremath{\rho}}^{}{}_{}{}^{2}}{[1\ensuremath{-}(\frac{{q}^{2}}{2{m}_{p}\ensuremath{\nu}})]}^{2}$, where $\ensuremath{\xi}$ is expected to be of the order of unity. Scale invariance (in the sense of Bjorken) is satisfied at very high ${q}^{2}$. The model may adequately account for the remarkably large cross section recently observed in the deep inelastic region.