Measurement of the<mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" display="inline"><mml:mi>A</mml:mi></mml:math>dependence of deep-inelastic electron scattering

Abstract

Cross sections for deep-inelastic electron scattering from liquid deuterium, gaseous $^{4}\mathrm{He}$, and solid Be, C, Al, Ca, Fe, Ag, and Au targets were measured at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center using electrons with energies ranging from 8 to 24.5 GeV. These data cover a range in the Bjorken variable $x$ from 0.089 to 0.8, and in momentum transfer ${Q}^{2}$ from 2 to 15 ${(\mathrm{G}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{V}/\mathit{c})}^{2}$. The ratios of cross sections per nucleon ${(\frac{{\ensuremath{\sigma}}^{A}}{{\ensuremath{\sigma}}^{d}})}_{\mathrm{is}}$ for isoscalar nuclei have been extracted from the data. These ratios are greater than unity in the range $0.1&lt;x&lt;0.3$, while for $0.3&lt;x&lt;0.8$ they are less than unity and decrease logarithmically with atomic weight $A$, or linearly with average nuclear density. No ${Q}^{2}$ dependence in the ratios was observed over the kinematic range of the data. These results are compared to various theoretical predictions.