Expected Precision of Higgs Boson Partial Widths within the Standard Model

We discuss the sources of uncertainty in calculations of the partial widths of the Higgs boson within the Standard Model. The uncertainties come from two sources: the truncation of perturbation theory and the uncertainties in input parameters. We review the current status of perturbative calculations and note that these are already reaching the parts-per-mil level of accuracy for the major decay modes. The main sources of uncertainty will then come from the parametric dependences on alpha_s, m_b, and m_c. Knowledge of these parameters is systematically improvable through lattice gauge theory calculations. We estimate the precision that lattice QCD will achieve in the next decade and the corresponding precision of the Standard Model predictions for Higgs boson partial widths.Comment: 20 pages, 1 figure; v2: minor typo correction

Improvement and Taste Symmetry Breaking for Staggered Quarks

We compare several improved actions for staggered quarks. We study the effect of improvement on the taste changing interactions by calculating the splitting in the pion spectrum. We investigate the effect of the improvement on some topological properties.Comment: 3 pages, 3 figures, Lattice 2003 proceeding

Pion Form Factor in the kTk_T Factorization Formalism

Based on the light-cone (LC) framework and the $k_T$ factorization formalism, the transverse momentum effects and the different helicity components' contributions to the pion form factor $F_{\pi}(Q^2)$ are recalculated. In particular, the contribution to the pion form factor from the higher helicity components ($\lambda_1+\lambda_2=\pm 1$), which come from the spin-space Wigner rotation, are analyzed in the soft and hard energy regions respectively. Our results show that the right power behavior of the hard contribution from the higher helicity components can only be obtained by fully keeping the $k_T$ dependence in the hard amplitude, and that the $k_T$ dependence in LC wave function affects the hard and soft contributions substantially. As an example, we employ a model LC wave function to calculate the pion form factor and then compare the numerical predictions with the experimental data. It is shown that the soft contribution is less important at the intermediate energy region.Comment: 21 pages, 4 figure

Improved Nonrelativistic QCD for Heavy Quark Physics

We construct an improved version of nonrelativistic QCD for use in lattice simulations of heavy quark physics, with the goal of reducing systematic errors from all sources to below 10\%. We develop power counting rules to assess the importance of the various operators in the action and compute all leading order corrections required by relativity and finite lattice spacing. We discuss radiative corrections to tree level coupling constants, presenting a procedure that effectively resums the largest such corrections to all orders in perturbation theory. Finally, we comment on the size of nonperturbative contributions to the coupling constants.Comment: 40 pages, 2 figures (not included), in LaTe

PHASE - An event generator for six fermion physics at the LHC

PHASE is a Monte Carlo event generator, under construction, for all Standard Model processes with six fermions in the final state at the LHC. It employs the full set of tree level Feynman diagrams, taking into account fermion masses for b quarks. The program can generate unweighted events for any subset of all six fermion final states in a single run, by making use of dedicated pre-samples. An interface to hadronization is provided.Comment: 4 pages, Latex, 1 figure. Talk given by E. Accomando at the IX International Workshop on Advanced Computing and Analysis Techniques in Physics Research (ACAT03), KEK, Tsukuba, December 1-5, 200

Higher Twist Distribution Amplitudes of the Nucleon in QCD

We present the first systematic study of higher-twist light-cone distribution amplitudes of the nucleon in QCD. We find that the valence three-quark state is described at small transverse separations by eight independent distribution amplitudes. One of them is leading twist-3, three distributions are twist-4 and twist-5, respectively, and one is twist-6. A complete set of distribution amplitudes is constructed, which satisfies equations of motion and constraints that follow from conformal expansion. Nonperturbative input parameters are estimated from QCD sum rules.Comment: 29 pages, 4 figures, eqn in (3.19) corrected, table 3 accordingly changed, some typos fixe

String Tension and Thermodynamics with Tree Level and Tadpole Improved Actions

We calculate the string tension, deconfinement transition temperature and bulk thermodynamic quantities of the SU(3) gauge theory using tree level and tadpole improved actions. Finite temperature calculations have been performed on lattices with temporal extent N_tau = 3 and 4. Compared to calculations with the standard Wilson action on this size lattices we observe a drastic reduction of the cut-off dependence of bulk thermodynamic observables at high temperatures. In order to test the influence of improvement on long-distance observables at T_c we determine the ratio T_c/sqrt(sigma). For all actions, including the standard Wilson action, we find results which differ only little from each other. We do, however, observe an improved asymptotic scaling behaviour for the tadpole improved action compared to the Wilson and tree level improved actions.Comment: 20 pages, LaTeX2e File, 8 coloured Postscript figures, new analysis added, recent Wilson action string tension results included, figures replace