In view of recent data from the Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility (JLab) on inclusive electron scattering off nuclei at high momentum transfer $(Q^2\gtrsim 1\hspace{0.5em}{\mathrm{GeV}}^2)$ and their current analysis, it is shown that, if the scaling variable is properly chosen, the analysis in terms of scaling functions can provide useful information on short-range correlations (SRC). This is demonstrated by introducing a new relativistic scaling variable that incorporates the momentum dependence of the excitation energy of the $(A-1)$ system, with the resulting scaling function being closely related to the longitudinal momentum distributions.

• Received 3 April 2009

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevC.79.051302