Comparison of high-energy electron and muon inelastic nuclear scatterings

Abstract

The inelastic scattering of 2.3, 5.0, and 13.6 GeV electrons are compared with that of 3.0, 8.0, and 10.1 GeV muons in nuclear emulsions. The partial and integral cross sections have been measured for all the beams and are compared with theory by using the first, second, and fourth power of $\frac{1}{(\frac{1+{q}^{2}}{m_{\ensuremath{\rho}}^{}{}_{}{}^{2}})}$ for ${\ensuremath{\sigma}}_{\mathrm{exp}}({q}^{2},\ensuremath{\nu})$, the quantity commonly called the "virtual-photon-nucleon total cross section." The muon-nucleon cross sections on the average are slightly smaller than the electron-nucleon cross sections. Experimentally no significant difference between the behavior of the muon and the electron in the inelasttic scattering has been found.