Top pair production at ultra-high energies

Abstract

The top quark, the heaviest quark and, indeed, the heaviest elementary particle known today, constitutes a novel probe of the long-lived medium in quark-gluon phase which, as expected, can be produced even in light nuclei collisions at ultra-high energies. Some distinctive features are considered for particle production in the top sector in ultra-high energy domain. The antitop-top pair production is studied within the quantum chromodynamics and effective field theory approach used for calculations of total partonic cross sections. Predictions for all observables are computed at NNLO in quantum chromodynamics and at LO in effective field theory. These quantitative results can be important for both the future collider experiments at center-of-mass energy frontier and the improvement of the phenomenological models for development of the cosmic ray cascades in ultra-high energy domain. Thus the study allows the better understanding of heavy particle production and emphasizes the exciting interrelation between the high-energy physics on accelerators and ultra-high energy cosmic ray measurements.