Probing colour flow with jet vetoes

We discuss jet vetoes as a means of probing colour flow in hard-scattering processes in hadronic collisions. As an example, we describe a calculation of the dijet cross-section with a jet veto, which resums the leading logarithms of the veto scale and is matched to a fixed-order computation. We compare this prediction to the measurement performed by the ATLAS collaboration. Finally, we outline future developments in this research area.Comment: Talk given at XX International Workshop on Deep-Inelastic Scattering and Related Subjects, 26th-30th March 2012, University of Bon

Vector boson production in joint resummation

We study the transverse momentum ($Q_T$) distribution of an electro-weak vector boson produced via the Drell-Yan mechanism, in the context of joint resummation. This formalism allows for the simultaneous resummation of logarithmic contributions that are enhanced at small $Q_T$ and at partonic threshold. We extend joint resummation to next-to-next-to leading logarithmic accuracy and we present resummed and matched results for three different phenomenological setups. In particular, we study the production of a $Z$ boson at the Tevatron and at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), as well as the production of a heavier $Z^\prime$ at the LHC. We compare our findings to standard $Q_T$ resummation, as well as to fixed-order perturbation theory. We find that joint resummation provides a moderate (but not flat) correction with respect to $Q_T$ resummation and it leads to a reduction of the scale dependence of the results. However, our study also shows some limitations of this formalism. While the use of joint resummation for $Z$ production at the Tevatron and $Z^\prime$ production at the LHC appears to be justified, our implementation suffers from a stronger dependence on power corrections for processes which are further away from threshold, such as $Z$ production at the LHC, for which we cannot claim an improvement over standard $Q_T$ resummation.Comment: 28 pages, 10 figures, published versio

High Energy Resummation of Drell-Yan Processes

We present a computation of the inclusive Drell-Yan production cross-section in perturbative QCD to all orders in the limit of high partonic centre-of-mass energy. We compare our results to the fixed order NLO and NNLO results in MSbar scheme, and provide predictions at NNNLO and beyond. Our expressions may be used to obtain fully resummed results for the inclusive cross-section.Comment: 18 pages, 5 figures: version to be published in NP

Small-xx resummation from HELL

Small-$x$ logarithmic enhancements arising from high-energy gluon emissions affect both the evolution of collinearly-factorized parton densities and partonic coefficient functions. With the higher collider energy reached by the LHC, the prospect of a future high-energy collider, and the recent deep-inelastic scattering (DIS) results at small-$x$ from HERA, providing phenomenological tools for performing small-$x$ resummation has become of great relevance. In this paper we discuss a framework to perform small-$x$ resummation for both parton evolution and partonic coefficient functions and we describe its implementation in a computer code named High-Energy Large Logarithms (HELL). We present resummed and matched results for the DGLAP splitting functions and, as a proof of principle, for the massless structure functions in DIS.Comment: Version accepted by EPJ C. 26 pages, 7 figures. Section 2.4 largely re-written. Added estimate of theoretical uncertainty and comparison to CCS

Sudakov Safety in Perturbative QCD

Traditional calculations in perturbative quantum chromodynamics (pQCD) are based on an order-by-order expansion in the strong coupling $\alpha_s$. Observables that are calculable in this way are known as "safe". Recently, a class of unsafe observables was discovered that do not have a valid $\alpha_s$ expansion but are nevertheless calculable in pQCD using all-orders resummation. These observables are called "Sudakov safe" since singularities at each $\alpha_s$ order are regulated by an all-orders Sudakov form factor. In this letter, we give a concrete definition of Sudakov safety based on conditional probability distributions, and we study a one-parameter family of momentum sharing observables that interpolate between the safe and unsafe regimes. The boundary between these regimes is particularly interesting, as the resulting distribution can be understood as the ultraviolet fixed point of a generalized fragmentation function, yielding a leading behavior that is independent of $\alpha_s$.Comment: 4+5 pages, 4 figures, 1 table. Version accepted for publication in PR

QCD calculations for jet substructure

We present results on novel analytic calculations to describe invariant mass distributions of QCD jets with three substructure algorithms: trimming, pruning and the mass-drop taggers. These results not only lead to considerable insight into the behaviour of these tools, but also show how they can be improved. As an example, we discuss the remarkable properties of the modified mass-drop tagger.Comment: Talk presented at various conferences including: ESI Program on Jets and QFT, Beyond the LHC Nordita Workshop, Boost 2013, QCD@LHC 2013, LC 2013 and Radcor 201