The charm content of W + 1 jet events as a probe of the strange quark distribution function

We investigate the prospects for measuring the strange quark distribution function of the proton in associated W plus charm quark production at the Tevatron. The W + c quark signal produced by strange quark-gluon fusion, sg → W^-c and overlinesg → W ⁺overlinec, is approximately 5% of the inclusive W + 1 jet cross section for jets with a transverse momentum p_T( j) > 10 GeV. We study the sensitivity of the W plus charm quark cross section to the parametrization of the strange quark distribution function, and evaluate the various background processes.