Unified description of rapidity gaps and energy flows in DIS final states

We show that the 'orthogonal' characteristics of the observed rapidity gaps and large forward energy flows in deep inelastic scattering at HERA, can be described within a single framework. Our Monte Carlo model is based on perturbative QCD matrix elements and parton showers together with Lund string model hadronization, but has in addition a new mechanism for soft colour interactions which modifies the perturbative colour structure and thereby the hadronization. Effects of perturbative multiparton emission are investigated and the non-perturbative treatment of the proton remnant is discussed and comparison to the observed transverse energy flow is made. We investigate the resulting diffractive-like properties of the model; such as rapidity gap events, t- and M_x-distributions and the diffractive structure function in comparison to H1 data.