An analytic coordinate-space expression for the next-to-leading order photon impact factor for small-$x$ deep inelastic scattering is calculated using the operator expansion in Wilson lines.
The photon impact factor for the BFKL pomeron is calculated in the next-to-leading order (NLO) approximation using the operator expansion in Wilson lines. The result is represented as a NLO $k_T$-factorization formula for the structure functions of small-$x$ deep inelastic scattering.
We accomplish the complete two-loop computation of the leading-twist contribution to the photon-pion transition form factor $gamma , gamma^{ast} to pi^0$ by applying the hard-collinear factorization theorem together with modern multi-loop techniques. The resulting predictions for the form factor indicate that the two-loop perturbative correction is numerically comparable to the one-loop effect in the same kinematic domain. We also demonstrate that our results will play a key role in disentangling various models of the twist-two pion distribution amplitude thanks to the envisaged precision at Belle II.
We study inclusive charged-hadron production in collisions of quasireal photons at NLO in perturbative QCD, using fragmentation functions recently extracted from PEP and LEP1 data. We superimpose the direct (DD), single-resolved (DR), and double-resolved (RR) gamma-gamma channels. First, we confront existing data taken by TASSO at PETRA and by MARK II at PEP with our NLO calculations. We also make comparisons with the neutral-kaon to charged-hadron ratio measured by MARK II. Then, we present NLO predictions for LEP2, a next-generation e+e- linear collider (NLC) in the TESLA design, and a Compton collider obtained by converting a NLC. We analyze transverse-momentum and rapidity spectra with regard to the scale dependence, the interplay of the DD, DR, and RR components, the sensitivity to the gluon density in the resolved photon, and the influence of gluon fragmentation. It turns out that the inclusive measurement of small-p_T hadrons at a Compton collider would greatly constrain the gluon density of the photon and the gluon fragmentation function.
We determine an approximate expression for the O(alpha_s^3) contribution chi_2 to the kernel of the BFKL equation, which includes all collinear and anticollinear singular contributions. This is derived using recent results on the relation between the GLAP and BFKL kernels (including running-coupling effects to all orders) and on small-x factorization schemes. We present the result in various schemes, relevant both for applications to the BFKL equation and to small-x evolution of parton distributions.
We compute the hydrodynamic relaxation times $tau_pi$ and $tau_j$ for hot QCD at next-to-leading order in the coupling with kinetic theory. We show that certain dimensionless ratios of second-order to first-order transport coefficients obey bounds which apply whenever a kinetic theory description is possible; the computed values lie somewhat above these bounds. Strongly coupled theories with holographic duals strongly violate these bounds, highlighting their distance from a quasiparticle description.