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Diffractive deep inelastic scattering in the dipole picture: The qq¯g contribution in exact kinematics

Abhiram Kaushik1,2, Heikki Mäntysaari1,2, and Jani Penttala3,4

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Phys. Rev. D 113, 074012 – Published 10 April, 2026

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/93cw-xp4l

Abstract

We compute the qq¯g contribution to the diffractive structure functions in high-energy deep inelastic scattering. The obtained result corresponds to a finite part of the next-to-leading-order contribution to the diffractive cross section. Previous phenomenological applications have included this contribution only in the high-Q2 or high-MX2 limits in the case of a soft gluon, and we numerically demonstrate that these existing estimates do not provide a good approximation for the full qq¯g contribution. Furthermore, we demonstrate that in addition to the soft gluon contribution, there is an equally important soft quark contribution to the diffractive structure functions at high Q2.

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Phys. Rev. D 113, 074012– Published 10 April, 2026
  • Received 17 November 2025
  • Accepted 13 March 2026
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Published by the American Physical Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article’s title, journal citation, and DOI. Funded by SCOAP3.

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