Deep inelastic scattering at low x: Generalized vector dominance and the color dipole picture

We summarize recent work on low-x deep inelastic scattering. The generalized vector dominance/color-dipole picture (GVD/CDP) implies a scaling behavior for $\sigma_{\gamma^* p} (W^2, Q^2)\cong \sigma_{\gamma^* p}(\eta)$, with $\eta = (Q^2 + m^2_0)/\Lambda^2 (W^2)$ and yields an excellent representation of the experimental results on $\sigma_{\gamma^* p}(\eta)$.