Hadron production in muon-proton and muon-deuteron collisions

This paper reports measurements of the hadrons produced in the inelastic scattering of 147-GeV muons by protons and deuterons in an experiment carried out at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory. Both the scattered muon and the hadrons were measured in a large spectrometer. Properties of the hadron spectra are presented for proton, deuteron, and neutron targets and compared with theoretical models and with hadron spectra from related processes. Emphasis is placed on the quark-parton model and the data are found to be in substantial agreement with it. The average transverse momentum of the hadrons with respect to the virtual photon direction shows no dependence on the muon scattering variables. The data display "jet behavior" of the inclusive hadrons comparable to that found in $e^{+}{e}^{-}$ annihilations.