Ph.D. Thesis by Mark Dickson

Title
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The Charge Asymmetry in W Boson Decays Produced in p-pbar Collisions

Thesis Advisor: Prof. Arie Bodek

University of Rochester, 1994

Abstract
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The charge asymmetry as a function of lepton rapidity, A(y), has been
measured at sqrt(s) = 1.8 TeV for |y| < 1.8, using the W decays to
electrons and muons recorded by the CDF detector during the 1992-93
run of the Tevatron Collider.  The large sample of 19,039 W -> ell nu
events (~ 20 pb^-1 of integrated luminosity) and detector improvements
have made discrimination between sets of modern parton distributions
possible, for the first time, using ppbar collider data.  The
asymmetry data is sensitive to the ratio of the d/u quark momentum
distributions in the proton.  The data favor the most recent parton
distributions and demonstrate the value of collider data in the
measurement of the proton's structure.  In particular it is found that
of the two current sets, those of Martin, Roberts and Stirling (MRS)
are favored over the sets produced by the CTEQ colloboration; this
difference is seen even though both sets are found to agree, at the
level of the nuclear shadowing corrections, with the recent
measurements of F^n_2/F^0_2 performed by NMC.  This measurement probes
the quark distributions to x < 0.01 at Q^2 = M_W^2, where
nonperturbative effects are minimal.



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