Nuclear parton distribution functions with uncertainties in the general mass variable flavor number scheme

• Hamzeh Khanpour (University of science and technology of Mazandaran and IPM)

The aim of this article is to describe a new set of nuclear parton distribution functions (nuclear PDFs) at next-to-leading order (NLO) and next-to-next-to-leading order (NNLO) accuracy in perturbative QCD. The most commonly used nuclear deep-inelastic scattering (DIS) data analyzed in this study are complemented by the available charged-current neutrino DIS experimental data with nuclear targets. The analysis also incorporates the data from Drell-Yan (DY) cross-section ratios for several nuclear targets. In addition, the most recent DIS data from the Jefferson Lab CLAS and Hall C experiments also added to our data sample. For these specific datasets, we consider the impact of the target mass corrections (TMCs) and higher twist effects (HT) which are important in the region of large x and intermediate-to-low Q2. This analysis is based on a publicly available open-source tool, APFEL, which has been modified to be applicable for our nuclear PDFs analysis. Heavy quark contributions to nuclear DIS are considered within the framework of the FONLL general mass variable-flavor-number scheme. The most recent CT18 PDFs are used as baseline proton PDFs. The uncertainties of nuclear PDFs are determined using the standard ’Hessian approach’. The main results of this global QCD analysis are compared with the existing nuclear PDF sets and with the fitted cross-sections. Very good agreement is achieved. The nuclear PDFs presented in this study are available via the standard LHAPDF library for applications in high-energy nuclear collisions.