Explicit Calculation Of the Running Coupling BFKL Anomalous Dimension

I calculate the anomalous dimension governing the Q^2 evolution of the gluon (and structure functions) coming from the running coupling BFKL equation. This may be expressed in an exact analytic form, up to a small ultraviolet renormalon contribution, and hence the corresponding splitting function may be determined precisely. Rather surprisingly it is most efficient to expand the gluon distribution in powers of alpha_s(Q^2) rather than use the traditional expansion where all orders of alpha_s\ln(1/x) are kept on an equal footing. The anomalous dimension is very different from that obtained from the fixed coupling equation, and leads to a powerlike behaviour for the splitting function as x ->0 which is far weaker, i.e. about x^(-0.2). The NLO corrections to the anomalous dimension are rather small, unlike the fixed coupling case, and a stable perturbative expansion is obtained.Comment: Tex file, including a modification of Harvmac, 15 pages, 5 figures as .ps file

Heavy quark production as sensitive test for an improved description of high energy hadron collisions

QCD dynamics at small quark and gluon momentum fractions or large total energy, which plays a major role for HERA, the Tevatron, RHIC and LHC physics, is still poorly understood. For one of the simplest processes, namely bottom-antibottom production, next-to-leading-order perturbation theory fails. We show that the combination of two recently developed theoretical concepts, the k_perp-factorization and the next-to-leading-logarithmic-approximation BFKL vertex, gives perfect agreement with data. One can therefore hope that these concepts provide a valuable foundation for the description of other high energy processes.Comment: RevTeX, 4 pages, 7 figures titel and abstract changed, several formulations modified in the text, 1 figure droppe

Rapidity-Separation Dependence and the Large Next-to-Leading Corrections to the BFKL Equation

Recent concerns about the very large next-to-leading logarithmic (NLL) corrections to the BFKL equation are addressed by the introduction of a physical rapidity-separation parameter $\Delta$. At the leading logarithm (LL) this parameter enforces the constraint that successive emitted gluons have a minimum separation in rapidity, $y_{i+1}-y_i>\Delta$. The most significant effect is to reduce the BFKL Pomeron intercept from the standard result as $\Delta$ is increased from 0 (standard BFKL). At NLL this $\Delta$-dependence is compensated by a modification of the BFKL kernel, such that the total dependence on $\Delta$ is formally next-to-next-to-leading logarithmic. In this formulation, as long as $\Delta\gtrsim2.2$ (for $\alpha_{s}=0.15$): (i) the NLL BFKL pomeron intercept is stable with respect to variations of $\Delta$, and (ii) the NLL correction is small compared to the LL result. Implications for the applicability of the BFKL resummation to phenomenology are considered.Comment: 16 pages, 3 figures, Late

A reliable rainfall–runoff model for flood forecasting: review and application to a semi-urbanized watershed at high flood risk in Italy

Many rainfall–runoff (RR) models are available in the scientific literature. Selecting the best structure and parameterization for a model is not straightforward and depends on a broad number of factors, including climatic conditions, catchment characteristics, temporal/spatial resolution and model objectives. In this study, the RR model 'Modello Idrologico Semi-Distribuito in continuo' (MISDc), mainly developed for flood simulation in Mediterranean basins, was tested on the Seveso basin, which is stressed several times a year by flooding events mainly caused by excessive urbanization. The work summarizes a compendium of the MISDc applications over a wide range of catchments in European countries and then it analyses the performances over the Seveso basin. The results show a good fit behaviour during both the calibration and the validation periods with a Nash–Sutcliffe coefficient index larger than 0.9. Moreover, the median volume and peak discharge errors calculated on several flood events were less than 25%. In conclusion, we can be assured that the reliability and computational speed could make the MISDc model suitable for flood estimation in many catchments of different geographical contexts and land use characteristics. Moreover, MISDc will also be useful for future support of real-time decision-making for flood risk management in the Seveso basin

Higgs production in gluon fusion at next-to-next-to-leading order QCD for finite top mass

The inclusive Higgs production cross section from gluon fusion is calculated through NNLO QCD, including its top quark mass dependence. This is achieved through a matching of the 1/mtop expansion of the partonic cross sections to the exact large s-hat limits which are derived from k_T-factorization. The accuracy of this procedure is estimated to be better than 1% for the hadronic cross section. The final result is shown to be within 1% of the commonly used effective theory approach, thus confirming earlier findings.Comment: 28 pages, 14 figure

Photon-Reggeon Interaction Vertices in the Nla

We calculate the effective vertices for the quark-antiquark and the quark-antiquark-gluon production in the virtual photon - Reggeized gluon interaction. The last vertex is considered at the Born level; for the first one the one-loop corrections are obtained. These vertices have a number of applications; in particular, they are necessary for calculation of the virtual photon impact factor in the next-to-leading logarithmic approximation.Comment: 20 pages, references adde

NLO BFKL Equation, Running Coupling and Renormalization Scales

I examine the solution of the BFKL equation with NLO corrections relevant for deep inelastic scattering. Particular emphasis is placed on the part played by the running of the coupling. It is shown that the solution factorizes into a part describing the evolution in Q^2, and a constant part describing the input distribution. The latter is infrared dominated, being described by a coupling which grows as x decreases, and thus being contaminated by infrared renormalons. Hence, for this part we agree with previous assertions that predictive power breaks down for small enough x at any Q^2. However, the former is ultraviolet dominated, being described by a coupling which falls like 1/(\ln(Q^2/\Lambda^2) + A(\bar\alpha_s(Q^2)\ln(1/x))^1/2)with decreasing x, and thus is perturbatively calculable at all x. Therefore, although the BFKL equation is unable to predict the input for a structure function for small x, it is able to predict its evolution in Q^2, as we would expect from the factorization theory. The evolution at small x has no true powerlike behaviour due to the fall of the coupling, but does have significant differences from that predicted from a standard NLO in alpha_s treatment. Application of the resummed splitting functions with the appropriate coupling constant to an analysis of data, i.e. a global fit, is very successful.Comment: Tex file, including a modification of Harvmac, 46 pages, 8 figures as .ps files. Correction of typos, updating of references, very minor corrections to text and fig.

Purine-metabolising enzymes and apoptosis in cancer

The enzymes of both de novo and salvage pathways for purine nucleotide synthesis are regulated to meet the demand of nucleic acid precursors during proliferation. Among them, the salvage pathway enzymes seem to play the key role in replenishing the purine pool in dividing and tumour cells that require a greater amount of nucleotides. An imbalance in the purine pools is fundamental not only for preventing cell proliferation, but also, in many cases, to promote apoptosis. It is known that tumour cells harbour several mutations that might lead to defective apoptosis-inducing pathways, and this is probably at the basis of the initial expansion of the population of neoplastic cells. Therefore, knowledge of the molecular mechanisms that lead to apoptosis of tumoural cells is key to predicting the possible success of a drug treatment and planning more effective and focused therapies. In this review, we describe how the modulation of enzymes involved in purine metabolism in tumour cells may affect the apoptotic programme. The enzymes discussed are: ectosolic and cytosolic 5′-nucleotidases, purine nucleoside phosphorylase, adenosine deaminase, hypoxanthine-guanine phosphoribosyltransferase, and inosine-5′-monophosphate dehydrogenase, as well as recently described enzymes particularly expressed in tumour cells, such as deoxynucleoside triphosphate triphosphohydrolase and 7,8-dihydro-8-oxoguanine triphosphatase

Expanding running coupling effects in the hard Pomeron

We study QCD hard processes at scales of order k^2 > Lambda^2 in the limit in which the beta-function coefficient - b is taken to be small, but alphas(k) is kept fixed. The (nonperturbative) Pomeron is exponentially suppressed in this limit, making it possible to define purely perturbative high-energy Green's functions. The hard Pomeron exponent acquires diffusion and running coupling corrections which can be expanded in the b parameter and turn out to be dependent on the effective coupling b alphas^2 Y. We provide a general setup for this b-expansion and we calculate the first few terms both analytically and numerically.Comment: 36 pages, 15 figures, additional references adde

The Gluon Impact Factors

We calculate in the next-to-leading approximation the non-forward gluon impact factors for arbitrary color state in the $t$-channel. In the case of the octet state we check the so-called "second bootstrap condition" for the gluon Reggeization in QCD, using the integral representation for the impact factors. The condition is fulfilled in the general case of an arbitrary space-time dimension and massive quark flavors for both helicity conserving and non-conserving parts.Comment: 32 pages, LaTeX, 1 EPS figure, uses epsf.sty and axodraw.st