Target and beam-target spin asymmetries in exclusive pion electroproduction for Q2>1 GeV2. I. ep→eπ+n

Beam-target double-spin asymmetries and target single-spin asymmetries were measured for the exclusive pi(+) electroproduction reaction. gamma(*) p -> n pi(+). The results were obtained from scattering of 6-GeV longitudinally polarized electrons off longitudinally polarized protons using the CEBAF Large Acceptance Spectrometer at Jefferson Laboratory. The kinematic range covered is 1.1 < W < 3 GeV and 1 < Q(2) < 6 GeV2. Results were obtained for about 6000 bins in W, Q(2), cos(theta(*)), and phi(*). Except at forward angles, very large target-spin asymmetries are observed over the entire W region. Reasonable agreement is found with phenomenological fits to previous data for W < 1.6 GeV, but very large differences are seen at higher values of W. A generalized parton distributions (GPD)-based model is in poor agreement with the data. When combined with cross-sectional measurements, the present results provide powerful constraints on nucleon resonance amplitudes at moderate and large values of Q(2), for resonances with masses as high as 2.4 GeV.