QCD corrections to double and single spin asymmetries in vector boson production at polarized hadron colliders Original Research Article

The production of W± and Z0 bosons in collisions of longitudinally polarized protons allows one to access various combinations of the polarized quark distributions from the study of double and single spin asymmetries. We compute the O(αs) corrections to these asymmetries as function of the vector boson rapidity y in the hadron-hadron centre-of-mass frame. Detailed studies of the numerical impact of the next-to-leading order corrections are presented. The theoretical uncertainties of an extraction of polarized quark distributions from future vector boson production data are investigated in detail.