Off-forward matrix elements in light-front Hamiltonian QCD

We investigate the off-forward matrix element of the light cone vector operator for a dressed quark state in light-front Hamiltonian perturbation theory. We obtain the corresponding splitting functions in a straightforward way. We show that the end point singularity is canceled by the contribution from the normalization of state. Considering mixing with the gluon operator, we verify the helicity sum rule in perturbation theory. We show that the quark mass effects are suppressed in the plus component of the matrix element but in the transverse component, they are not suppressed. We emphasize that this is a particularity of the off-forward matrix element and is absent in the forward case. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.