Flavor asymmetry of the nucleon sea and W-boson production

The advantage and feasibility of using W-boson production to extract unique information on the flavor asymmetry of the u¯ and d¯ sea-quark distributions in the proton are examined. The W+ and W− production cross section ratios in p+p collisions are shown to be sensitive to the d¯/u¯ ratios, and they are free from charge-symmetry-breaking and nuclear-binding effects. The feasibility for measuring these ratios at the RHIC and LHC proton-proton colliders, as well as the expected sensitivity to the d¯/u¯ ratios, are also presented.