Neutral-current weak interactions at an EIC

Abstract.

A simulation study of measurements of neutral current structure functions of the nucleon at the future high-energy and high-luminosity polarized electron-ion collider (EIC) is presented. A new series of $\gamma$-Z interference structure functions, $F_{1}^{\gamma Z}$, $F_{3}^{\gamma Z}$, $g_{1}^{\gamma Z}$, $g_{5}^{\gamma Z}$ become accessible via parity-violating asymmetries in polarized electron-nucleon deep inelastic scattering (DIS). Within the context of the quark-parton model, they provide a unique and, in some cases, yet-unmeasured combination of unpolarized and polarized parton distribution functions. The uncertainty projections for these structure functions using electron-proton collisions are considered for various EIC beam energy configurations. Also presented are uncertainty projections for measurements of the weak mixing angle $\sin^{2} \theta_{W}$ using electron-deuteron collisions which cover a much higher $Q^{2}$ than that accessible in fixed target measurements. QED and QCD radiative corrections and effects of detector smearing are included with the calculations.