  So far no theoretical tool for the comprehensive description of exclusive
electroproduction of vector mesons off nuclei at medium energies has been
developed. We suggest a light-cone QCD formalism which is valid at any energy
and incorporates formation effects (color transparency), the coherence length
and the gluon shadowing. At medium energies color transparency (CT) and the
onset of coherence length (CL) effects are not easily separated. Indeed,
although nuclear transparency measured by the HERMES experiment rises with Q^2,
it agrees with predictions of the vector dominance model (VDM) without any CT
effects. Our new results and observations are: (i) the good agreement with the
VDM found earlier is accidental and related to the specific correlation between
Q^2 and CL for HERMES kinematics; (ii) CT effects are much larger than have
been estimated earlier within the two channel approximation. They are even
stronger at low than at high energies and can be easily identified by HERMES or
at JLab; (iii) gluon shadowing which is important at high energies is
calculated and included; (iv) our parameter-free calculations explain well
available data for variation of nuclear transparency with virtuality and energy
of the photon; (v) predictions for electroproduction of \rho and \phi are
provided for future measurements at HERMES and JLab.
