Final state interaction in semi-inclusive DIS off nuclei

The final state interaction in DIS of leptons off a nucleus A, due to the propagation of the struck nucleon debris and its hadronization in the nuclear environment is considered. The effective cross section of such a partonic system with the nucleons of the medium and its time dependence are estimated on the basis of a model which takes into account the production of hadrons due to the breaking of the color string and to gluon radiation. It is shown that the details of the propagation of the partonic system in the nuclear environment can be thoroughly investigated by the semi-inclusive process A(e,e'(A-1))X, in which the scattered lepton is detected in coincidence with the nucleus (A-1) in low energy and momentum states. The rescattering of the struck nucleon debris with the medium damps and distorts the momentum distributions of (A-1) in a way which is very sensitive to the details of effective cross section of the debris. The total cross section of the process on ^4He, ^16O, and ^40Ca, related to the probability that after a target nucleon experiences a DIS process, the recoiling (A-1) nucleus remains intact, is evaluated, and the distorted momentum distribution of the recoiling (A-1) system is obtained. It is shown that both quantities are very sensitive to the details of the early stage of hadronization of the nucleon debris in the nuclear medium.