The leading jet transverse momentum in inclusive jet production and with a loose jet veto

Abstract

We study the transverse momentum of the leading jet in the limit where the jet radius is small, $R\ll 1$. We introduce the leading-jet function to calculate this cross section for an inclusive jet sample, and the subleading-jet function when a loose veto on additional jets is imposed, i.e. $p_{T,J} \gtrsim p_T^{\rm veto}$. These jet functions are calculated at next-to-leading order in QCD and the resummation of jet radius logarithms is explored. We present phenomenological results for Higgs + 1 jet production, for both the jet and Higgs transverse momentum distribution. We find that, while the $R \ll 1$ limit of the cross section provides a good description of the full NLO result, even for values as large as $R=0.8$, simply retaining the leading logarithm at this order does not. Indeed, the NLO contribution to the hard function and, to a lesser extent, non-logarithmic corrections to the jet function are sizable and must be included to obtain the correct cross section. In the inclusive cross section we find that the $\alpha_s^2 \ln^2R$ corrections are several precent, while in exclusive cross sections at large $p_{T,J}$ and small $R$ they can reach 20%. However, it is not clear how important the resummation of these logarithms is, given the presence of other large corrections at NNLO.