Scaling relations for hadron continuum scattering from carbon

Abstract

Five scaling relations familiar from analyses of inclusive electron scattering spectra on complex nuclei are applied to 65 inclusive continuum spectra of protons, positive kaons, and pions incident upon carbon. Beam energies range from 300 MeV to 18.3 GeV with momentum transfers such that the conditions for quasifree scattering are met, similar to those for many electron scattering analyses. Several very strong assumptions need to be made to apply these scaling analyses to hadrons, and so the requirement that these spectra come into agreement under a scaling analysis is a severe test of these assumptions. Scaling is found in the sense that the responses of four of the five systems considered do agree over a significant range of momentum transfers for the three hadron species over a wide range of beam energies. Responses other than those for quasifree scattering destroy the validity of scaling systems for hadrons at large angles or momentum transfers or high beam energies.