Determination of small x shadowing corrections at DESY HERA

Abstract

The recent F2 data can be described using the DGLAP evolution equations with an appropriate choice of input distributions and the choice of the starting scale for the Q2 evolution. We demonstrate in this paper that we cannot conclude that there are no significant shadowing corrections in the DESY HERA kinematic region using F2 data only. In this paper we calculate the shadowing corrections to the longitudinal structure function FL(x,Q2) and to the charm component of the proton structure function F2 c (x,Q2) in the HERA kinematic region using an eikonal approach. We demonstrate that the shadowing corrections to these observables are very large and that charm production is strongly modified at small x. Our results agree with the few recent H1 data. [S0556-2821(99)05103-6]