Top anti-top pair production via b quark initiated processes at the Large Hadron Collider

We study $bt\bar t$ production via subprocesses initiated by $b$-quarks at the Large Hadron Collider. Both QCD and electroweak interactions are included in the elementary scattering amplitudes for $bg\to b t\bar t$. Since the additional jet in the final state (arising from the bottom quark) is in most cases at very low transverse momentum and very high pseudorapidity, it tends to escape detection. Therefore, such a process can act as a background to double-top as well as to single-top channels exploited in top quark phenomenology at present and future hadron colliders. Furthermore, if the additional $b$-jet can be tagged then $bt\bar t$ samples can be exploited in constraining possible effects of New Physics. The relevance of this reaction in such contexts is discussed and various total and differential rates of phenomenological interest are givenComment: 29 pages, latex, epsfig, 6 postscript figures, complete paper available at ftp://axpa.hep.phy.cam.ac.uk/moretti/cavendish_9703 and at http://www.hep.phy.cam.ac.uk/theory/papers