Systematic Uncertainties from Gribov Copies in Lattice Calculation of Parton Distributions in the Coulomb Gauge

Abstract Recently, a new method has been proposed to compute parton distributions using boosted correlators fixed in the Coulomb gauge (CG) within the framework of large-momentum effective theory. This approach, which does not involve Wilson lines, could greatly improve the efficiency and precision of lattice quantum chromodynamics calculations. However, concerns remain regarding whether systematic uncertainties from Gribov copies, which correspond to ambiguities in lattice gauge-fixing, are adequately controlled. This work assesses the effects of Gribov copies on Coulomb-gauge-fixed quark correlators. We utilize different strategies for Coulomb-gauge fixing, selecting two different groups of Gribov copies based on lattice gauge configurations. We examine the differences in the resulting spatial quark correlators in both vacuum and pion states. Our findings indicate that the statistical errors of the matrix elements from both Gribov copies, regardless of the correlation range, decrease proportionally to the square root of the number of gauge configurations. The difference between the strategies does not show statistical significance compared to the gauge noise, demonstrating that the effect of the Gribov copies can be neglected in practical lattice calculations of quark parton distributions.