Polarized antiquark flavor asymmetry in Drell–Yan pair production

Abstract. We investigate the role of the flavor asymmetry of the nucleon's polarized antiquark distributions in Drell–Yan lepton pair production in polarized nucleon–nucleon collisions at HERA (fixed–target) and RHIC energies. It is shown that the large polarized antiquark flavor asymmetry predicted by model calculations in the large–$N_c$ limit (chiral quark–soliton model) has a dramatic effect on the double spin asymmetries in high mass lepton pair production, as well as on the single spin asymmetries in lepton pair production through $W^\pm$–bosons at $M^2 = M_W^2$.