Jet Trimming

Initial state radiation, multiple interactions, and event pileup can contaminate jets and degrade event reconstruction. Here we introduce a procedure, jet trimming, designed to mitigate these sources of contamination in jets initiated by light partons. This procedure is complimentary to existing methods developed for boosted heavy particles. We find that jet trimming can achieve significant improvements in event reconstruction, especially at high energy/luminosity hadron colliders like the LHC.Comment: 20 pages, 11 figures, 3 tables - Minor changes to text/figure

RR Lyrae variables in the globular cluster M3 (NGC5272). I. BVI CCD photometry

New BVI CCD photometry is presented for 60 RR Lyrae variables in the globular cluster M3. Light curves have been constructed and ephemerides have been (re)-derived for all of them. Four stars (i.e. V29, V136, V155 and V209), although recognized as variables, had no previous period determinations. Also, the period derived for V129 is significantly different from the one published by Sawyer-Hogg (1973). Light curve parameters, i.e. mean magnitudes, amplitudes and rise-times, have been derived. The discussion of these results in the framework of the stellar evolution and pulsation theories will be presented in a forthcoming paper.Comment: 19 pages, latex, uses mn.sty, 12 encapsulated figures, to be published in MNRAS, text and figures also available at http://www.bo.astro.it/bap/BAPhome.html or via anonymous ftp at ftp://boas3.bo.astro.it/bap/files (bap98-12-textfig.ps

D^* production from e^+e^- to ep collisions in NLO QCD

Fragmentation functions for D mesons, based on the convolution of a perturbative part, related to the heavy quark perturbative showering, and a non-perturbative model for its hadronization into the meson, are used to describe D^* production in e^+e^- and ep collisions. The non-perturbative part is determined by fitting the e^+e^- data taken by ARGUS and OPAL at 10.6 and 91.2 GeV respectively. When fitting with a non perturbative Peterson fragmentation function and using next-to-leading evolution for the perturbative part, we find an epsilon parameter sensibly different from the one commonly used, which is instead found with a leading order fit. The use of this new value is shown to increase considerably the cross section for D^* production at HERA, suggesting a possible reconciliation between the next-to-leading order theoretical predictions and the experimental data.Comment: 20 pages, LaTeX2e, 8 Postscript figure

Jet Reconstruction in Heavy Ion Collisions

We examine the problem of jet reconstruction at heavy-ion colliders using jet-area-based background subtraction tools as provided by FastJet. We use Monte Carlo simulations with and without quenching to study the performance of several jet algorithms, including the option of filtering, under conditions corresponding to RHIC and LHC collisions. We find that most standard algorithms perform well, though the anti-kt and filtered Cambridge/Aachen algorithms have clear advantages in terms of the reconstructed transverse-momentum offset and dispersion.Comment: 31 pages, 17 figure

A note on the fate of the Landau-Yang theorem in non-Abelian gauge theories

Using elementary considerations of Lorentz invariance, Bose symmetry and BRST invariance, we argue why the decay of a massive color-octet vector state into a pair of on-shell massless gluons is possible in a non-Abelian SU(N) Yang-Mills theory, we constrain the form of the amplitude of the process and offer a simple understanding of these results in terms of effective-action operators.Comment: 7 pages. v2: typos corrected, one reference adde

A Short Review on Jet Identification

Jets can be used to probe the physical properties of the high energy density matter created in collisions at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC). Measurements of strong suppression of inclusive hadron distributions and di-hadron correlations at high $p_{T}$ have already provided evidence for partonic energy loss. However, these measurements suffer from well-known geometric biases due to the competition of energy loss and fragmentation. These biases can be avoided if the jets are reconstructed independently of their fragmentation details - quenched or unquenched. In this paper, we discuss modern jet reconstruction algorithms (cone and sequential recombination) and their corresponding background subtraction techniques required by the high multiplicities of heavy ion collisions. We review recent results from the STAR experiment at RHIC on direct jet reconstruction in central Au+Au collisions at $\sqrt {s_{NN}}= 200$ GeV.Comment: Proceedings for the invited talk of Hot Quarks 2008, Estes Park, CO 18-23 August 200

Theoretical predictions for charm and bottom production at the LHC

We present predictions for a variety of single-inclusive observables that stem from the production of charm and bottom quark pairs at the 7 TeV LHC. They are obtained within the FONLL semi-analytical framework, and with two "Monte Carlo + NLO" approaches, MC@NLO and POWHEG. Results are given for final states and acceptance cuts that are as close as possible to those used by experimental collaborations and, where feasible, are compared to LHC data.Comment: 22 pages, 10 figure

Charmonium Production via Fragmentation at DESY HERA

The cross section for the photoproduction of large-p_T J/psi mesons at HERA is calculated at next-to-leading order, adopting a perturbative approach to describe the fragmentation of charm quarks and gluons into J/psi mesons. We treat the charm quark according to the massless factorization scheme, where it is assumed to be one of the active flavours inside the proton and the resolved photon. We present inclusive distributions in transverse momentum and rapidity, including the contributions due to direct and resolved photons. The importance of the colour-octet components of the J/psi wave function, which contribute to the fragmentation process, is emphasized. In addition to prompt J/psi production, we consider also the production of chi_{cJ} states followed by radiative decays to J/psi mesons, both in the colour-singlet and colour-octet channels.Comment: 32 pages (Latex), 12 figures (Postscript