We briefly illustrate recent developments in the parton branching formulation of TMD evolution and their impact on precision measurements in high-energy hadronic collisions.
We present the first determination of transverse momentum dependent (TMD) photon densities with the Parton Branching method. The photon distribution is generated perturbatively without intrinsic photon component. The input parameters for quarks and gluons are determined from fits to precision measurements of deep inelastic scattering cross sections at HERA. The TMD densities are used to predict the mass and transverse momentum spectra of very high mass lepton pairs from both Drell-Yan production and Photon-Initiated lepton processes at the LHC.
Collinear and transverse momentum dependent (TMD) parton densities are obtained from fits to precision measurements of deep inelastic scattering (DIS) cross sections at HERA. The parton densities are evolved by DGLAP evolution with next-to-leading-order (NLO) splitting functions using the parton branching method, allowing one to determine simultaneously collinear and TMD densities for all flavors over a wide range in $x$, $mu^2$ and $k_t$, relevant for predictions at the LHC. The DIS cross section is computed from the parton densities using perturbative NLO coefficient functions. Parton densities satisfying angular ordering conditions are presented. Two sets of parton densities are obtained, differing in the renormalization scale choice for the argument in the strong coupling alpha_s. This is taken to be either the evolution scale $mu$ or the transverse momentum $q_t$. While both choices yield similarly good $chi^2$ values for the fit to DIS measurements, especially the gluon density turns out to differ between the two sets. The TMD densities are used to predict the transverse momentum spectrum of Z-bosons at the LHC.
We study parton-branching solutions of QCD evolution equations and present a method to construct both collinear and transverse momentum dependent (TMD) parton densities from this approach. We work with next-to-leading-order (NLO) accuracy in the strong coupling. Using the unitarity picture in terms of resolvable and non-resolvable branchings, we analyze the role of the soft-gluon resolution scale in the evolution equations. For longitudinal momentum distributions, we find agreement of our numerical calculations with existing evolution programs at the level of better than 1 percent over a range of five orders of magnitude both in evolution scale and in longitudinal momentum fraction. We make predictions for the evolution of transverse momentum distributions. We perform fits to the high-precision deep inelastic scattering (DIS) structure function measurements, and we present a set of NLO TMD distributions based on the parton branching approach.
We map the spectrum of $1to 2$ parton splittings inside a medium characterized by a transport coefficient $hat q$ onto the kinematical Lund plane, taking into account the finite formation time of the process. We discuss the distinct regimes arising in this map for in-medium splittings, pointing out the close correspondence to a semi-classical description in the limit of hard, collinear radiation with short formation times. Although we disregard any modifications of the original parton kinematics in course of the propagation through the medium, subtle modifications to the radiation pattern compared to the vacuum baseline can be traced back to the physics of color decoherence and accumulated interactions in the medium. We provide theoretical support to vacuum-like emissions inside the medium by delimiting the regions of phase space where it is dominant, identifying also the relevant time-scales involved. The observed modifications are shown to be quite general for any dipole created in the medium.
Study of the hadronic matrix elements can provide not only tests of the QCD sector of the Standard Model (in comparing with existing experiments) but also reliable low-energy hadronic quantities applicable to a wide range of beyond-the-Standard Model scenarios where experiments or theoretical calculations are limited or difficult. On the QCD side, progress has been made in the notoriously difficult problem of addressing gluonic structure inside the nucleon, reaching higher-$Q^2$ region of the form factors, and providing a complete picture of the proton spin. However, even further study and improvement of systematic uncertainties are needed. There are also proposed calculations of higher-order operators in the neutron electric dipole moment Lagrangian, which would be useful when combined with effective theory to probe BSM. Lattice isovector tensor and scalar charges can be combined with upcoming neutron beta-decay measurements of the Fierz interference term and neutrino asymmetry parameter to probe new interactions in the effective theory, revealing the scale of potential new TeV particles. Finally, I revisit the systematic uncertainties in recent calculations of $g_A$ and review prospects for future calculations.