Viewing the Proton Through "Color"-Filters

Abstract

While the form factors and parton distributions provide separately the shape of the proton in coordinate and momentum spaces, a more powerful imaging of the proton structure can be obtained through phase-space distributions. Here we introduce the Wigner-type quark and gluon distributions which depict a full-3D proton at every fixed light-cone momentum, like what seen through momentum("color")-filters. After appropriate phase-space reductions, the Wigner distributions are related to the generalized parton distributions (GPD's) and transverse-momentum dependent parton distributions which are measurable in high-energy experiments. The new interpretation of GPD's provides a classical way to visualize the orbital motion of the quarks which is known to be the key to the spin and magnetic moment of the proton.

4 pages