arXiv subjects
W. J. Stirling
Publications and source records attributed to W. J. Stirling.
Anomalous triple and quartic gauge boson couplings
This article reviews some recent developments in the analysis of anomalous triple and quartic vector boson couplings that have been discussed at the UK Phenomenology Workshop on Collider Physics 1999 in Durham.
A Monte Carlo for BFKL Physics
Virtual photon scattering in e^+e^- collisions can result in events with the electron-positron pair at large rapidity separation with hadronic activity in between. The BFKL equation resums large logarithms that dominate the cross section for this process. We report here on a Monte Carlo method for solving the BFKL equation that allows kinematic constraints to be taken into account. The application to e^+e^- collisions is in progress.
BFKL Monte Carlo for Dijet Production at Hadron Colliders
The production of jet pairs at large rapidity difference at hadron colliders is potentially sensitive to BFKL physics. We present the results of a BFKL Monte Carlo calculation of dijets at the Tevatron. The Monte Carlo incorporates kinematic effects that are absent in analytic BFKL calculations; these effects significantly modify the behavior of dijet cross sections.
Detecting Heavy Charged Higgs Bosons at the LHC with Four b-Quark Tags
We investigate the signature of a heavy charged Higgs boson of the Minimal Supersymmetric Standard Model in the lepton plus multi-jet channel at the Large Hadron Collider with four $b$-tags. The signal is the gluon-gluon fusion process $gg\to t\bar b H^-$, followed by the $H^-\to \bar t b$ decay, while the main background is from $gg\to t\bar t b\bar b$. We find that the two can be separated effectively by kinematic cuts and mass reconstruction, but the signal size is not very large in the end. Nonetheless, with a good $b$-tagging efficiency, $ε_b\sim50%$, this channel can provide a viable signature over a limited but interesting range of the parameter space.
On the Resummation of Subleading Logarithms in the Transverse Momentum Distribution of Vector Bosons Produced at Hadron Colliders
The perturbation series for electroweak vector boson production at small transverse momentum is dominated by large double logarithms at each order in perturbation theory. An accurate theoretical prediction therefore requires a resummation of these logarithms. This can be performed either directly in transverse momentum space or in impact parameter (Fourier transform) space. While both approaches resum the same leading double logarithms, the subleading logarithms are, in general, treated differently. We comment on two recent approaches to this problem, emphasising the particular subleading logarithms resummed in each case and the numerical differences in the cross sections which result.
Parton Distributions and the LHC: W and Z Production
W and Z bosons will be produced copiously at the LHC proton-proton collider. We study the parton distribution dependence of the total production cross sections and rapidity distributions, paying particular attention to the uncertainties arising from uncertainties in the parton distributions themselves. Variations in the gluon, the strong coupling, the sea quarks and the overall normalisation are shown to lead to small but non-negligible variations in the cross section predictions. Ultimately, therefore, the measurement of these cross sections will provide a powerful cross check on our knowledge of parton distributions and their evolution.
Hadronic returns to the Z in electron-positron annihilation at high energy
The production of four hadronic jets in e+e- collisions above the Z pole is dominated by the QCD e+e- --> qqqq,qqgg processes and, for sufficiently high energy, the electroweak e+e- --> W+W- --> qqqq process. However there is another mechanism for producing four jets, e+e- --> Z gg --> qqgg, which can be regarded as a `hadronic return' to the Z pole. We investigate this new process in detail
Update of MRST partons
We discuss topical issues concerning the MRST parton analysis. We introduce some new parton sets in order to estimate the uncertainty in the cross sections predicted for W and Z production at the Tevatron and the LHC. We compare with CTEQ5 partons.
Theoretical aspects of high--Q^2 deep inelastic scattering
We present an overview of the theory of high--Q^2 deep inelastic scattering. We focus in particular on the theoretical uncertainties in the predictions for neutral and charged current cross sections obtained by extrapolating from lower Q^2.
Restoring good high energy behaviour in Higgs production via W fusion at the LHC
The W-fusion scattering process W+W- --> ZZ for off-shell W bosons is studied, focusing on the issue of its high-energy behaviour which is known to be anomalous. It is shown that the unitarity violating terms can be isolated and extracted in a well-defined and efficient way using the pinch-technique. This restores the good high energy behaviour of the cross section and, in particular, makes possible the identification of the Higgs resonance in the invariant mass distribution M(ZZ) of the Z pair. The discarded terms, which are proportional to the off-shellness of the W bosons, cancel against similar terms originating from the remaining diagrams for the full physical process f1 f2 --> f1' f2' Z Z. This cancellation ensures the gauge invariance of our result, which therefore constitutes a meaningful separation between signal and background when they both contribute coherently. Equipped with this result, we are able to define a resonant approximation for the process p p --> Z Z + 2 jets + X, which circumvents the problem of good high energy behaviour without having to resort to the lengthy calculation of the complete set of diagrams. In this approximation only the W and Z fusion signal graphs are included, i.e. the ones which contain the Higgs resonance. We have verified that the approximate resonant cross section describes very well the full result not only close to the resonance but also beyond it.
Spin correlations in $e^+e^-\to 4 jets$
Existence of discrepancies between experimental data and Monte Carlo predictions for angular distributions in four-jet production via $e^+e^-$ annihilation has been known for some time at LEP1. As such QCD processes constitute significant backgrounds to $e^+e^-\to W^+W^-\to 4$-jet production at LEP2, we consider the possibility that an erroneous modelling of the helicity structure of the final-state partons could affect the accuracy of experimental measurements of the $W^\pm$ boson parameters
A BFKL Monte Carlo Approach to Jet Production at Hadron-hadron and Lepton-hadron Colliders
The production of a pair of jets with large rapidity separation in hadron-hadron collisions, and of forward jets in deep inelastic scattering, can in principle be used to test the predictions of the BFKL equation. However in practice kinematic constraints lead to a strong suppression of BFKL effects for these processes. This is illustrated using a BFKL Monte Carlo approach.
Scheme dependence, leading order and higher twist studies of MRST partons
We extend a recent global analysis of nucleon parton distributions carried out at next-to-leading order (NLO) in the MSbar scheme to provide distributions in the so-called DIS scheme. We pay particular attention to the translation of the heavy quark distributions in going from the MSbar to the DIS scheme. We repeat the global analysis at leading order (LO) and comment on the major effects produced when going from LO to NLO. Finally we include in the global analysis a freely parameterised form of possible higher twist contributions to make an exploratory study of the size of these effects as a function of x.
BFKL Physics in Dijet Production at the LHC
The production in hadron-hadron collisions of jet pairs with large rapidity separation and comparable modest transverse momentum is, in principle, described by the perturbative QCD BFKL equation. The measurement of such jet pairs appears well suited to the LHC detectors, with their ability to detect forward jets. We present predictions for dijet cross sections and correlations obtained using a BFKL Monte Carlo which allows kinematic and other subleading effects to be incorporated. The enhanced phase space for gluon emission at the LHC makes the BFKL behavior somewhat easier to observe than at the Tevatron, although kinematic effects are still important. The production of forward jets in association with heavy Higgs bosons via the gauge boson fusion mechanism is also studied and compared with QCD dijet production.
J/psi production at the Tevatron and HERA: the effect of k_T smearing
We study the effects of intrinsic transverse momentum smearing on J/psi production both at the Tevatron and at HERA. For the case of large-p_T J/psi production at the Tevatron, the effects due to k_T smearing are mild. On the other hand, inelastic J/psi photoproduction at HERA is very sensitive to the k_T smearing and, in fact, with a reasonable value of it is possible to resolve the large-z discrepancy seen by comparing non-relativistic QCD (NRQCD) predictions with the HERA data. We conclude that, with the present kinematic cuts, photoproduction at HERA is not a good test of NRQCD.
Topology of Hadronic Flows for Higgs Production at Hadron Colliders
Hadronic radiation provides a tool to distinguish different topologies of colour flow in hard scattering processes. We study the structure of hadronic flow corresponding to Higgs production and decay in high-energy hadron-hadron collisions. In particular, the signal gg -> H -> b anti-b and background gg -> b anti-b processes are shown to have very different radiation patterns, and this may provide an useful additional method for distinguishing Higgs signal events from the QCD background.
A BFKL Monte Carlo approach to jet production at hadron-hadron and lepton-hadron colliders
The production of a pair of jets with large rapidity separation in hadron-hadron collisions, and of forward jets in deep inelastic scattering, can in principle be used to test the predictions of the BFKL equation. However in practice kinematic constraints lead to a strong suppression of BFKL effects for these processes. This is illustrated using a BFKL Monte Carlo approach.