Deep inelastic scattering from A = 3 nuclei: Nucleon structure and the EMC effect
The MARATHON experiment ran at Jefferson Laboratory in 2018, measuring deep inelastic scattering of 10.6 GeV electrons from the proton (p), deuterium (D), tritium ( 3 H), and helium-3 ( 3 He). MARATHON's experimental observables are cross section ratios, most notably 3 H/ 3 He. This ratio of mirror nuclei is used for a novel extraction of the nucleon structure function ratio $F^n_2$ /$F^p_2$ with minimal nuclear corrections. Determining leading-order $F^n_2$ /$F^p_2$ at high x provides important constrains on the ratio of nucleon valence quark distributions d/u. The ratios 3 H/D and 3 He/D allow a determination of the EMC effect in the lightest nuclei sensitive to possible isospin dependence of nuclear effects. Lastly, the D/p ratio allows a comparison of the MARATHON experiment to SLAC measurements, and provides data to which the A = 3 ratios can be renormalized. The MARATHON results provide new constraints on d/u. Additionally, the results emphasize the importance of higher-order effects in extracting $F^n_2$ /$F^p_2$ from DIS measurements, and can help constrain said effects. In the renormalization scheme applied in the MARATHON analysis, no significant isospin dependence of the EMC effect is observed.