Studies of Proton Structure from Photo- and Electro-Production of Light Vector Mesons

The analysis of light vector meson production by a high-energy electron or photon beam in a particle accelerator provides insight into the composition of the proton, further expanding the fundamental understanding of physics. The electro-production of light vector mesons off of protons happens when a high virtuality photon interacts with a quark, which can be studied to extract the Generalized Parton Distributions (GPDs). These functions provide access to the correlation between the longitudinal momenta of partons and their transverse position. They can be further interpreted to obtain multidimensional images of the proton. Vector mesons are particularly sensitive to the GPDs H and E and allow for flavor decomposition of the proton's GPDs. We implemented various vector mesons in a generator used in simulations for Jefferson Laboratory (DEEPGen) and for EIC (DEEPSim). Our goal is to contribute to the development of future Hard Exclusive (light) Vector Meson experiments for Jefferson Laboratory and EIC. We will discuss the physical interest of measuring light vector mesons for accessing GPDs, then present our work with the event generator and our projections for future experiments.