arXiv subjects

Simone Zoia

Publications and source records attributed to Simone Zoia.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

Two-loop QCD amplitudes for $t\bar{t}W$ production at the LHC in the leading-colour approximation

We present a numerical computation of the two-loop QCD scattering amplitudes for the production of a top-antitop quark pair in association with a $W$ boson ($t\bar{t}W$) at the LHC in the generalised leading-colour approximation, retaining the exact dependence on the top-quark and $W$-boson masses. Rather than pursuing a fully analytic calculation, we employ a hybrid framework that combines numerical evaluation with strong algebraic and analytic control, allowing ultraviolet and infrared singularities as well as large intermediate cancellations to be treated exactly. This is achieved by expressing the finite remainder in terms of a set of special functions with rational coefficients. The special functions are evaluated numerically by solving differential equations through power-series expansions, while the values of the rational coefficients are reconstructed, point by point, from finite-field evaluations. The calculation is performed in the 't Hooft-Veltman scheme and validated against an independent implementation in conventional dimensional regularisation employing a substantially different computational strategy. We finally provide the colour- and polarisation-summed hard functions evaluated on the phase-space grid used in a previous computation of the next-to-next-to-leading-order QCD corrections to the $t\bar{t}W$ cross section.

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arXiv2026

NNLO QCD predictions for $t\bar t W$ production at hadron colliders

The production of a top-antitop quark pair in association with a $W$ boson constitutes one of the heaviest final states currently studied at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN. Measurements of its production rate have consistently exceeded Standard Model predictions. Owing to the complexity of the two-loop amplitudes entering the double-virtual correction, next-to-next-to-leading-order (NNLO) QCD calculations for this process have so far employed dynamical approximations for the two-loop contribution. We present NNLO QCD predictions based, for the first time, on a direct computation of the required two-loop amplitudes in the generalised leading-colour limit.

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arXiv2026

The Four-Jet Rate in Electron-Positron Annihilation at Order $\alpha_s^4$

We compute for the first time the production rate for four jets in electron-positron annihilation at next-to-next-to-leading order. Our calculation exhibits the highest final-state jet multiplicity considered at this perturbative accuracy to date. The cancellation of infrared singularities is achieved in the antenna subtraction scheme, relying particularly on generalized antenna functions. The evaluation of the two-loop virtual corrections is enabled by the construction of a new basis of transcendental special functions tailored to four-particle decay kinematics. Our results are compared with LEP data, finding improved agreement with respect to the next-to-leading order calculation. In the region where perturbative predictions are most reliable, we observe a significant reduction of theory uncertainties, which now fall below the experimental ones.

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arXiv2025

Higher-order QCD corrections to top-quark pair production in association with a jet

The production of a top-quark pair, the heaviest known elementary particle, in association with a light jet is a key process for studying the properties of the Standard Model of Particle Physics. Due to its significance as a signal process with considerable sensitivity to the top-quark mass and as a background process for new physics searches, it is crucial to predict differential cross sections with high precision. In this article, we present, for the first time, predictions for various kinematical observables at next-to-next-to-leading order in Quantum Chromodynamics. The perturbative behavior is analyzed, and uncertainties arising from missing higher-order contributions are substantially reduced. The necessary two-loop amplitudes have been evaluated in the leading-color approximation, and we provide estimates for the impact of the missing contributions.

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arXiv2025

Double virtual QCD corrections to $t\bar{t}+$jet production at the LHC

We present a leading colour computation of the double virtual contributions to top-quark pair production in association with a jet at a hadron collider at next-to-next-to-leading order in QCD. The finite remainders of the two-loop amplitudes, after subtraction of infrared and ultraviolet divergences, are extracted analytically from evaluations over finite fields by using a (potentially) overcomplete basis of special functions defined through their differential equations. We construct the colour- and spin-summed interference with the tree-level amplitudes and present a \texttt{C++} library suitable for immediate use in phenomenological studies. We present new techniques for the evaluation of the special functions through direct numerical integration of differential equations which perform well across the full physical phase space.

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arXiv2025

Two-loop Feynman integrals for leading colour $t\bar{t}W$ production at hadron colliders

We compute a complete set of the two-loop Feynman integrals that are required for the next-to-next-to-leading order QCD corrections to on-shell top-pair production in association with a $W$ boson at hadron colliders in the leading colour approximation. These Feynman integrals also contribute to Higgs or $Z$-boson production in association with a top pair. We employ the method of differential equations (DEs), facilitated by the use of finite field methods to handle the algebraic complexity stemming from the seven-scale kinematics. The presence of the top quark in the virtual propagators, in addition to the mass of the external $W$ boson, gives rise to nested square roots and three elliptic curves. We obtain DEs that depend at most quadratically on the dimensional regulator $\epsilon$ for sectors where these analytic structures appear, and are $\epsilon$-factorised otherwise. We express the DEs in terms of a minimal set of differential one-forms, separating the logarithmic ones. We solve the DEs numerically in the physical kinematic region, with the method of generalised power series expansions.

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arXiv2025

Canonical differential equations for the elliptic two-loop five-point integral family relevant to $t\bar t +$jet production at leading colour

We present differential equations (DEs) in canonical form for a family of two-loop five-point Feynman integrals containing elliptic functions and nested square roots. This is the only family for which canonical DEs were not yet available among those required to compute the two-loop leading-colour amplitude for top-pair production in association with a jet at hadron colliders. We write the DEs in terms of one-forms having (locally) simple poles at all singular points, and highlight the `duplet' structure that generalises the even/odd charge of square roots to nested roots. All transcendental functions in the DEs are expressed in closed form using complete elliptic integrals, while one-forms free of elliptic functions are given in terms of logarithms, including those with the nested roots. In addition to marking a significant step towards next-to-next-to-leading order QCD predictions for an important LHC process, this work represents the first time that a canonical basis of integrals involving elliptic functions has been obtained for a five-particle process.

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arXiv2024

Numerical evaluation of two-loop QCD helicity amplitudes for $gg\to t \bar{t} g$ at leading colour

We present the first benchmark evaluation of the two-loop finite remainders for the production of a top-quark pair in association with a jet at hadron colliders in the gluon channel. We work in the leading colour approximation, and perform the numerical evaluation in the physical phase space. To achieve this result, we develop a new method for expressing the master integrals in terms of a (over-complete) basis of special functions that enables the infrared and ultraviolet poles to be cancelled analytically despite the presence of elliptic Feynman integrals. The special function basis makes it manifest that the elliptic functions appear solely in the finite remainder, and can be evaluated numerically through generalised series expansions. The helicity amplitudes are constructed using four dimensional projectors combined with finite-field techniques to perform integration-by-parts reduction, mapping to special functions and Laurent expansion in the dimensional regularisation parameter.

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arXiv2024

Full-colour double-virtual amplitudes for associated production of a Higgs boson with a bottom-quark pair at the LHC

We present the double-virtual amplitudes contributing to the production of a Higgs boson in association with a $b\bar{b}$ pair at the Large Hadron Collider. We perform the computation within the five-flavour scheme, which employs massless bottom quarks and finite bottom-Yukawa coupling, taking into account all the colour structures. We derive the analytic form of the helicity amplitudes through finite-field reconstruction techniques. The analytic expressions have been implemented in a public C++ library, and we demonstrate that evaluations are sufficiently stable and efficient for use in phenomenological studies.

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arXiv2024

Two-loop amplitudes for $\mathcal{O}(\alpha_s^2)$ corrections to $W\gamma\gamma$ production at the LHC

We present the two-loop helicity amplitudes contributing to the next-to-next-to-leading order QCD predictions for W-boson production in association with two photons at the Large Hadron Collider. We derived compact analytic expressions for the two-loop amplitudes in the leading colour limit, and provide numerical results for the subleading colour contributions. We employ a compact system of integration-by-part identities provided by the NeatIBP package, allowing for an efficient computation of the rational coefficients of the scattering amplitudes over finite fields.

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arXiv2024

Two-Loop Five-Point Two-Mass Planar Integrals and Double Lagrangian Insertions in a Wilson Loop

We consider the complete set of planar two-loop five-point Feynman integrals with two off-shell external legs. These integrals are relevant, for instance, for the calculation of the second-order QCD corrections to the production of two heavy vector bosons in association with a jet or a photon at a hadron collider. We construct pure bases for these integrals and reconstruct their analytic differential equations in canonical form through numerical sampling over finite fields. The newly identified symbol alphabet, one of the most complex to date, provides valuable data for bootstrap methods. We then apply our results to initiate the study of double Lagrangian insertions in a four-cusp Wilson loop in planar maximally supersymmetric Yang-Mills theory, computing it through two loops. We observe that it is finite, conformally invariant in four dimensions, and of uniform transcendentality. Furthermore, we provide numerical evidence for its positivity within the amplituhedron region through two loops.

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arXiv2024

Lepton-Pair Scattering With an Off-Shell and an On-Shell Photon at Two Loops in Massless QED

I present the computation of the two-loop amplitudes for the scattering of a lepton pair with an off-shell and an on-shell photon in massless QED. We apply modern techniques developed to tackle QCD amplitudes with many scales: we express the Feynman integrals in terms of a basis of special functions, and reconstruct the amplitudes from numerical finite-field evaluations. Our results complete the amplitude-level ingredients for the N3LO predictions of electron-muon scattering needed to meet the precision target of the future MUonE experiment.

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arXiv2024

Two-loop integrals for $t \bar{t} +$jet production at hadron colliders in the leading colour approximation

We compute the differential equations for the two remaining integral topologies contributing to the leading colour two-loop amplitudes for $pp \rightarrow t\bar{t}j$. We derive differential equations for the master integrals by solving the integration-by-parts identities over finite fields. Of the two systems of differential equations, one is presented in canonical '${\rm d} \log$' form, while the other is found to have an elliptic sector. For the elliptic topology we identify the relevant elliptic curve, and present the differential equations in a more general form which depends quadratically on $\epsilon$ and contains non-logarithmic one-forms in addition to the canonical ${\rm d} \log$'s. We solve the systems of differential equations numerically using generalised series expansions with the boundary terms obtained using the auxiliary mass flow method. A summary of all one-loop and two-loop planar topologies is presented including the list of alphabet letters for the '${\rm d} \log$' form systems and high-precision boundary values.

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arXiv2023

Learning Feynman integrals from differential equations with neural networks

We perform an exploratory study of a new approach for evaluating Feynman integrals numerically. We apply the recently-proposed framework of physics-informed deep learning to train neural networks to approximate the solution to the differential equations satisfied by the Feynman integrals. This approach relies neither on a canonical form of the differential equations, which is often a bottleneck for the analytical techniques, nor on the availability of a large dataset, and after training yields essentially instantaneous evaluation times. We provide a proof-of-concept implementation within the PyTorch framework, and apply it to a number of one- and two-loop examples, achieving a mean magnitude of relative difference of around 1% at two loops in the physical phase space with network training times on the order of an hour on a laptop GPU.

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arXiv2023

Two-loop five-particle scattering amplitudes

I discuss the recent advances in the computation of two-loop scattering amplitudes for five-particle processes. The latter are fundamental ingredients to obtain predictions at the next-to-next-to-leading order (NNLO) in QCD for many interesting LHC processes. I discuss the state-of-the-art technology for computing scattering amplitudes analytically, and present new results relevant for the LHC phenomenology.

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arXiv2023

Lepton-pair scattering with an off-shell and an on-shell photon at two loops in massless QED

We compute the two-loop QED helicity amplitudes for the scattering of a lepton pair with an off-shell and an on-shell photon, $0\to\ell\bar\ell\gamma\gamma^*$, using the approximation of massless leptons. We express all master integrals relevant for the scattering of four massless particles with a single external off-shell leg up to two loops in a basis of algebraically independent multiple polylogarithms, which guarantees an efficient numerical evaluation and compact analytic representations of the amplitudes. Analytic forms of the amplitudes are reconstructed from numerical evaluations over finite fields. Our results complete the amplitude-level ingredients contributing to the N$^3$LO predictions of electron-muon scattering $e\mu\to e\mu$, which are required to meet the precision goal of the future MUonE experiment.

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arXiv2023

All Two-Loop Feynman Integrals for Five-Point One-Mass Scattering

We compute the complete set of two-loop master integrals for the scattering of four massless particles and a massive one. Our results are ready for phenomenological applications, removing a major obstacle to the computation of complete next-to-next-to-leading order (NNLO) QCD corrections to processes such as the production of a $H/Z/W$ boson in association with two jets at the LHC. Furthermore, they open the door to new investigations into the structure of quantum-field theories and provide precious analytic data for studying the mathematical properties of Feynman integrals.

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arXiv2023

Scattering Amplitudes in Quantum Field Theory

These lecture notes bridge a gap between introductory quantum field theory (QFT) courses and state-of-the-art research in scattering amplitudes. They cover the path from basic definitions of QFT to amplitudes relevant for processes in the Standard Model of particle physics. The book begins with a concise yet self-contained introduction into QFT, including perturbative quantum gravity. It then presents modern methods for calculating scattering amplitudes, focusing on tree-level amplitudes, loop-level integrands and loop-integration techniques. These methods help reveal intriguing relations between gauge and gravity amplitudes, and are of increasing importance for obtaining high-precision predictions for collider experiments, such as those at CERN's Large Hadron Collider, as well as for foundational mathematical physics studies in QFT, including recent applications to gravitational wave physics. These course-tested lecture notes include numerous exercises with detailed solutions. Requiring only minimal knowledge of QFT, they are well-suited for MSc and PhD students as a preparation for research projects in theoretical particle physics. They can be used as a one-semester graduate level course, or as a self-study guide for researchers interested in fundamental aspects of QFT. Supplementary material, Mathematica notebooks, corrections and further information are provided and maintained at the dedicated website https://scattering-amplitudes.mpp.mpg.de/scattering-amplitudes-in-qft/ .

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