Phenomenology of asymptotically free theories in deep inelastic scattering: (I). Electron and muon scattering

We calculate the predictions of asymptotically free theories for deep inelasric scattering using a straightforward Mellin transform technique which uses a minimum of theoretical assumptions. Parameterizing the quark and anti-quark distributions functions, we fit all the available μ and e scattering data. We investigate the sensitivity of the theory of the (almost) unknown gluon distributions and the choice of scaling variable. The best fit uses the formalism of Georgi and Politzer for the 1/Q² terms with a quark gluon coupling constant g²/4π ～ 1 at Q² = 1 (GeV/c)². (Equivalently the scale parameter Λ is 500 MeV/c.) Good fits are also found in simpler models using x, x′ or ξ as scaling variables. The best value of Λ depends strongly on the choice of scaling variable.