Preliminary results searching for the onset of color transparency in A(e,e'p) in Hall C at Jefferson Lab

Color transparency (CT) is a fundamental phenomenon of QCD postulating that at high momentum transfer, one can preferentially measure hadrons that fluctuate to a small color neutral transverse size in the nucleus, and final state interactions within the nuclear medium are sup- pressed. CT is observed experimentally as a rise in the measured nuclear transparency as a function of the momentum transferred. While CT has been observed for mesons, it remains unconfirmed in baryons. Observation of CT in baryons would provide a new means to study the nuclear strong force and would be the first clear observation of hadrons fluctuating to a small size in the nucleus. An enhancement in the nuclear transparency was observed in A(p,2p) reactions at Brookhaven. This experiment, E1206107, seeks to confirm the measurement of pro- ton transparency as well as to measure the onset. During the spring of 2018, this experiment was the first to run in Hall C at Jefferson Lab using the recently upgraded 12 GeV electron beam and obtained four kinematic points at momentum transfer Q^2 from 8-14.3 GeV^2, overlapping the same region where Brookhaven previously observed an enhancement. This ex- periment used the High Momentum Spectrometer (HMS) and Super High Momentum Spectrometer (SHMS) in coincidence to measure A(e,e'p) on a carbon target. This talk will summarize the motivation to measure the onset of color transparency in baryons and will present preliminary results from this experiment. DOE Grant Number: DE-FG02-07ER41528