I review the predictions of the total cross section for many models, and point out that some of them lead to the conclusion that the standard experimental analysis may lead to systematic errors much larger than expected.
It is very likely that hadronic scattering will enter a new regime at the LHC, as the black-disk limit is reached. This will lead to a severe change in the t dependence of the real part and of the slope of the elastic scattering amplitude, and in turn this may bias the measurement of the total cross section. We examine this issue, and suggest new strategies to test the reliability of the total cross section measurements.
We present results for the total top-pair production cross section at the Tevatron and the LHC. Our predictions supplement fixed-order results with resummation of soft logarithms and Coulomb singularities to next-to-next-to-leading (NNLL) logarithmic accuracy and include top-antitop bound-state effects. The effects of resummation, the dependence on the PDF set used, the residual sources of theoretical uncertainty and their implication for measurements of the top-quark mass are discussed.
A model for the total photoproduction cross section based on the ansatz that resummation of infrared gluons limits the rise induced by QCD minijets in all the total cross-sections, is used to simulate extended air showers initiated by cosmic rays with the AIRES simulation program. The impact on common shower observables, especially those related with muon production, is analysed and compared with the corresponding results obtained with previous photoproduction models.
An empirical model for the $pp$ elastic differential cross section is proposed. Inspired by early work by Barger and Phillips, we parametrize the scattering amplitude in building blocks, comprising of two exponentials with a relative phase, supplementing the dominant term at small $-t$ with the proton form factor. This model suitably applies to LHC7 and ISR data, enabling to make simple predictions for higher LHC energies and to check whether asymptotia might be achieved.
In this paper we apply to photoproduction total cross-section a model we have proposed for purely hadronic processes and which is based on QCD mini-jets and soft gluon re-summation. We compare the predictions of our model with the HERA data as well as with other models. For cosmic rays, our model predicts substantially higher cross-sections at TeV energies than models based on factorization but lower than models based on mini-jets alone, without soft gluons. We discuss the origin of this difference.