Short-distance Part Research Articles

Branching fraction of the decay B+ → π+τ+τ− and lepton flavor universality test via the ratio Rπ(τ/μ)

Among (semi)leptonic rare B-decays induced by the b→d flavor changing neutral current, the decay B+→π+μ+μ− is the only one observed so far experimentally. Related decays involving the e+e− and τ+τ− pairs are the targets for the ongoing experiments at the LHC, in particular LHCb, and Belle II. The muonic and electronic semileptonic decays have almost identical branching fractions in the Standard Model (SM). However, the tauonic decay B+→π+τ+τ− differs from the other two due to the higher reaction threshold which lies slightly below the ψ(2S)-resonance. We present calculations of the ditauon (τ+τ−) invariant-mass distribution and the branching fraction Br(B+→π+τ+τ−) in the SM based on the Effective Electroweak Hamiltonian approach, taking into account also the so-called long-distance contributions. The largest theoretical uncertainty in the short-distance part of the decay rates is due to the B→π form factors, which we quantify using three popular parametrizations. The long-distance contribution can be minimized by a cut on the ditauon mass mτ+τ−>Mψ(2S). Once available, the branching fractions in the tauonic and muonic (and electronic) modes provide stringent test of the lepton flavor universality in the b→d transitions. We illustrate this by calculating the ratio Rπ(τ/μ)≡Br(B+→π+τ+τ−)/Br(B+→π+μ+μ−) in the SM for the total and binned ratios of the branching fractions.

Forward light-by-light scattering and electromagnetic correction to hadronic vacuum polarization

Lattice QCD calculations of the hadronic vacuum polarization (HVP) have reached a precision where the electromagnetic (e.m.) correction can no longer be neglected. This correction is both computationally challenging and hard to validate, as it leads to ultraviolet (UV) divergences and to sizeable infrared (IR) effects associated with the massless photon. While we precisely determine the UV divergence using the operator-product expansion, we propose to introduce a separation scale Λ ~ 400 MeV into the internal photon propagator, whereby the calculation splits into a short-distance part, regulated in the UV by the lattice and in the IR by the scale Λ, and a UV-finite long-distance part to be treated with coordinate-space methods, thereby avoiding power-law finite-size effects altogether. In order to predict the long-distance part, we express the UV-regulated e.m. correction to the HVP via the forward hadronic light-by-light (HLbL) scattering amplitude and relate the latter via a dispersive sum rule to γ∗γ∗ fusion cross-sections. Having tested the relation by reproducing the two-loop QED vacuum polarization (VP) from the tree-level γ∗γ∗→ e+e− cross-section, we predict the expected lattice-QCD integrand resulting from the γ∗γ∗→ π0 process.

New determination of |Vcb| using the three-loop QCD corrections for the B → D⁎ semi-leptonic decays

We present a new determination of the Cabibbo-Kobayashi-Maskawa matrix element |Vcb| by using the three-loop perturbative QCD corrections for the B→D⁎ semi-leptonic decay. The decay width of B→D⁎ semi-leptonic decay can be factorized as perturbatively calculable short-distance part and the non-perturbative but universal long-distance part. We adopt the principle of maximum conformality (PMC) single-scale setting approach to deal with the perturbative series so as to achieve a precise fixed-order prediction for the short-distance parameter ηA. By applying the PMC, an overall effective αs value is achieved by recursively using the renormalization group equation, which inversely results in a precise scale-invariant pQCD series. Such scale-invariant series also provides a reliable basis for predicting the contributions from uncalculated perturbative terms. We then obtain ηA=0.9225−0.0168+0.0117, where the error is the squared average of those from Δαs(MZ)=±0.0010 and the uncertainties caused by the uncalculated higher-order perturbative terms. By using the data of B→D⁎ℓν¯ℓ, we finally obtain |Vcb|PMC=(40.60−0.57+0.53)×10−3, which is consistent with the PDG value within errors.

Revealing the short-range structure of the mirror nuclei 3H and 3He

When protons and neutrons (nucleons) are bound into atomic nuclei, they are close enough to feel significant attraction, or repulsion, from the strong, short-distance part of the nucleon-nucleon interaction. These strong interactions lead to hard collisions between nucleons, generating pairs of highly energetic nucleons referred to as short-range correlations (SRCs). SRCs are an important but relatively poorly understood part of nuclear structure1-3, and mapping out the strength and the isospin structure (neutron-proton (np) versus proton-proton (pp) pairs) of these virtual excitations is thus critical input for modelling a range of nuclear, particle and astrophysics measurements3-5. Two-nucleon knockout or 'triple coincidence' reactions have been used to measure the relative contribution of np-SRCs and pp-SRCs by knocking out a proton from the SRC and detecting its partner nucleon (proton or neutron). These measurements6-8 have shown that SRCs are almost exclusively np pairs, but they had limited statistics and required large model-dependent final-state interaction corrections. Here we report on measurements using inclusive scattering from the mirror nuclei hydrogen-3 and helium-3 to extract the np/pp ratio of SRCs in systems with a mass number of three. We obtain a measure of the np/pp SRC ratio that is an order of magnitude more precise than previous experiments, and find a marked deviation from the near-total np dominance observed in heavy nuclei. This result implies an unexpected structure in the high-momentum wavefunction for hydrogen-3 and helium-3. Understanding these results will improve our understanding of the short-range part of the nucleon-nucleon interaction.

Exclusive production of a pair of high transverse momentum photons in pion-nucleon collisions for extracting generalized parton distributions

We show that exclusive production of a pair of high transverse momentum photons in pion-nucleon collisions can be systematically studied in QCD factorization approach if the photon’s transverse momentum qT with respect to the colliding pion is much greater than ΛQCD. We demonstrate that the leading power non-perturbative contributions to the scattering amplitudes of this exclusive process are process-independent and can be systematically factorized into universal pion’s distribution amplitudes (DAs) and nucleon’s generalized parton distributions (GPDs), which are convoluted with corresponding infrared safe and perturbatively calculable short-distance hard parts. The correction to this factorized expression is suppressed by powers of 1/qT. We demonstrate quantitatively that this new type of exclusive processes is not only complementary to existing processes for extracting GPDs, but also capable of providing an enhanced sensitivity to the dependence of both DAs and GPDs on the active parton’s momentum fraction x. We also introduce additional, but the same type of exclusive observables to enhance our capability to explore GPDs, in particular, their x-dependence.

Color-octet contributions for J/ψ inclusive production at B factories in soft gluon factorization

We have studied color-octet contributions for J/ψ inclusive production at B factories, i.e., e+e− → J/ψ(3 {P}_J^{left[8right]} ,1 {S}_0^{left[8right]} ) + {X}_{mathrm{non}-coverline{c}} , using the soft gluon factorization (SGF) approach, in which the J/ψ energy spectrum is expressed in a form of perturbatively calculable short-distance hard parts convoluted with one-dimensional soft gluon distributions (SGDs). The series of velocity corrections originated from kinematic effect can be naturally resummed in this approach. Short-distance hard parts have been calculated analytically to next-to-leading order in αs. Renormalization group equations for SGDs have been derived and solved, which resums Sudakov logarithms originated from soft gluon emissions. Our final result gives a upper bound for color-octet matrix elements consistent with that extracted from hadron colliders. This may relieve the well-known universality problem in the NRQCD factorization.As a comparison, we also analytically calculated short-distance hard parts in the NRQCD factorization, with Sudakov logarithms resummed by using soft collinear effective theory. The comparison shows that velocity corrections from kinematic effect, which have been resummed in SGF, are significant for phenomenological study. Furthermore, it is found that Sudakov logarithms originated from soft gluon emissions are very important, while it is not the case for Sudakov logarithms originated from jet function. Therefore, the partial Sudakov resummation in SGF has already captured the main physics.

Anisotropic quantum Hall states in the presence of interactions with fourfold rotational symmetry

We study the effects of anisotropic interactions in the quantum Hall effect in the presence of a fourfold discrete rotational ($C_4$) symmetry. Employing the density matrix renormalization group technique on an infinite cylinder geometry (iDMRG), we calculate the anisotropy response of the Laughlin state at $\nu=1/3$ and the composite-Fermi liquid (CFL) state at $\nu=1/2$. We find that the anisotropy transferred from the interaction potential to the $\nu=1/3$ state is stronger when compared to the complementary case of an anisotropic band. Further, the strength of anisotropy reduces as the interaction is made shorter ranged. Quite surprisingly, at $\nu=1/2$, we find that the deformation in the CF Fermi-surface changes sign as the interaction range is reduced. Our results imply that the short-distance and long-distance parts of the interaction potential have opposite effects on the CFL state in the presence of $C_4$-symmetric anisotropy.

Effective field theory approach to lepton number violating τ decays * *Supported in part by the Grants No. NSFC-12035008, No. NSFC-11975130, by The National Key Research and Development Program of China under Grant No. 2017YFA0402200, by the CAS Center for Excellence in Particle Physics (CCEPP). XDM is supported by the MOST (109-2112-M-002-017-MY3, 109-2811-M-002-535)

We continue our endeavor to investigate lepton number violating (LNV) processes at low energies in the framework of effective field theory (EFT). In this work we study the LNV tau decays , where and denote the lowest-lying charged pseudoscalars . We analyze the dominant contributions in a series of EFTs from high to low energy scales, namely the standard model EFT (SMEFT), the low-energy EFT (LEFT), and the chiral perturbation theory ( ). The decay branching ratios are expressed in terms of the Wilson coefficients of dimension-five and -seven operators in SMEFT and the hadronic low-energy constants. These Wilson coefficients involve the first and second generations of quarks and all generations of leptons; thus, they cannot be explored in low-energy processes such as nuclear neutrinoless double beta decay or LNV kaon decays. Unfortunately, the current experimental upper bounds on the branching ratios are too weak to set useful constraints on these coefficients. Alternatively, if we assume the new physics scale is larger than 1 TeV, the branching ratios are well below the current experimental bounds. We also estimate the hadronic uncertainties incurred in applying to decays by computing one-loop chiral logarithms and attempt to improve the convergence of chiral perturbation by employing dispersion relations in the short-distance part of the decay amplitudes.

Fragmentation function of g \u2192 Qoverline{Q} (3 {S}_1^{left[8right]} ) in soft gluon factorization and threshold resummation

We study the fragmentation function of the gluon to color-octet 3S1 heavy quark-antiquark pair using the soft gluon factorization (SGF) approach, which expresses the fragmentation function in a form of perturbative short-distance hard part convoluted with one-dimensional color-octet 3S1 soft gluon distribution (SGD). The short distance hard part is calculated to the next-to-leading order in αs and all orders in velocity expansion. By deriving and solving the renormalization group equation of the SGD, threshold logarithms are resummed to all orders in perturbation theory. The comparison with gluon fragmentation function calculated in NRQCD factorization approach indicates that the SGF formula resums a series of velocity corrections in NRQCD which are important for phenomenological study.

Short-range DFT energy correction to multiconfigurational wave functions for open-shell systems.

Electronic structure methods emerging from the combination of multiconfigurational wave functions and density functional theory (DFT) aim to take advantage of the strengths of the two nearly antagonistic theories. One of the common strategies employed to merge wave function theory (WFT) with DFT relies on the range separation of the Coulomb operator in which DFT functionals take care of the short-distance part, while long-range inter-electronic interactions are evaluated by using the chosen wave function method (WFT-srDFT). In this work, we uncover the limitations of WFT-srDFT in the characterization of open-shell systems. We show that spin polarization effects have a major impact on the (short-range) DFT exchange energy and are of vital importance in order to provide a balanced description between closed and open-shell configurations. We introduce different strategies to account for spin polarization in the short range based on the definition of a spin polarized electron density and with the use of short-range exact exchange. We test the performance of these approaches in the dissociation of the hydrogen molecule, the calculation of energy gaps in spin-triplet atoms and molecular diradicals, and the characterization of low-lying states of the gallium dimer. Our results indicate that the use of short-range DFT correlation in combination with a (full-range) multiconfigurational wave function might be an excellent approach for the study of open-shell molecules and largely improves the performance of WFT and WFT-srDFT.

Dark nucleosynthesis: cross-sections and astrophysical signals

We investigate dark matter bound-state formation and its implication for indirect-detection experiments. We focus on the case where dark matter is a baryon of a strongly-coupled dark sector and provide generic formulae for the formation of shallow nuclear bound states on emission of photons, and W and Z gauge bosons. These processes can occur via electric and magnetic transitions, and give rise to indirect signals that are testable in monochromatic and diffuse photon measurements by Fermi and HESS. We also study the validity of factorizing the bound-state formation cross section into a short-distance nuclear part multiplied by Sommerfeld-enhancement factors. We find that the short-distance nuclear potential often violates factorization, modifying in particular the location of the peaks associated with zero-energy bound states. Finally we revisit bound-state formation of a (weakly-coupled) Minimal DM quintuplet including isospin-breaking effects, and find it gives rise to indirect-detection signals that are compatible with current bounds.

Stopping power of hot dense deuterium-tritium plasmas mixed with impurities to charged particles.

In this work, we studied the stopping power of deuterium-tritium (DT) plasmas mixed with impurities to the injected charged particles. Based on the Brown-Preston-Singleton model, the analytical expression for the change ratio of stopping power (denoted by η) induced by impurities in DT plasmas is developed, in which both classical short-distance collision part and quantum correction contribution are purely linear response to the impurity concentration ξ_{X}, while the classical long-range collision brings about higher-order nonlinear response to ξ_{X}. Furthermore, the expression for change ratio of deposition depth (denoted by χ) of charged particles induced by impurities in DT plasmas is also derived. As applications, we systemically investigated the energy loss of α particles deposited into a hot dense DT plasma mixed with impurity X(X=C, Si, Ge), where the temperature and density of DT are smaller than 10 keV and 500 g/cm^{3} and the concentration of Xξ_{X} is less than 5%. The numerical results suggest that (i) for the case of C mixed into DT, both change ratios of stopping power and deposition depth of α particles (i.e., η and χ) are linear response to the concentration of C ξ_{C}; (ii) for the case of Si mixed into DT, the second-order nonlinear response of η and χ to ξ_{Si} cannot be ignored when the densities of DT are larger than 200 g/cm^{3}; and (iii) for the case of Ge mixed into DT, the second- and third-order nonlinear response of η and χ to ξ_{Ge} are very remarkable because of the higher ionization degree and heavier atomic mass of Ge. The formulas and findings in this work may be helpful to the research of internal confinement fusion (ICF) related implosion physics and may provide useful theoretical guidance and data for the design of ICF target.

Intrinsic three-body nuclear interaction from a constituent quark model

We study the short distance part of the intrinsic three-nucleon interaction in a constituent quark model with color-spin interaction. For that purpose we first calculate the transformation coefficient between the tribaryon configuration and their corresponding three baryon basis. Using a formula for the intrinsic three-body interaction in terms of a tribaryon configuration, we find that after subtracting the corresponding two-baryon contributions, the intrinsic three-body interaction vanishes in flavor SU(3) symmetric limit for all quantum numbers for the three nucleon states. We further find that the intrinsic three-body interaction also vanishes for flavor-spin type of quark interaction.

Comparing proton momentum distributions in A = 2 and 3 nuclei via 2H 3H and 3He (e,e′p) measurements

We report the first measurement of the (e,e′p) reaction cross-section ratios for Helium-3 (He3), Tritium (H3), and Deuterium (d). The measurement covered a missing momentum range of 40≤pmiss≤550MeV/c, at large momentum transfer (〈Q2〉≈1.9 (GeV/c)2) and xB>1, which minimized contributions from non quasi-elastic (QE) reaction mechanisms. The data is compared with plane-wave impulse approximation (PWIA) calculations using realistic spectral functions and momentum distributions. The measured and PWIA-calculated cross-section ratios for He3/d and H3/d extend to just above the typical nucleon Fermi-momentum (kF≈250 MeV/c) and differ from each other by ∼20%, while for He3/H3 they agree within the measurement accuracy of about 3%. At momenta above kF, the measured He3/H3 ratios differ from the calculation by 20%−50%. Final state interaction (FSI) calculations using the generalized Eikonal Approximation indicate that FSI should change the He3/H3 cross-section ratio for this measurement by less than 5%. If these calculations are correct, then the differences at large missing momenta between the He3/H3 experimental and calculated ratios could be due to the underlying NN interaction, and thus could provide new constraints on the previously loosely-constrained short-distance parts of the NN interaction.

Effects of finite-range interactions on the one-electron spectral properties of one-dimensional metals: Application to Bi/InSb(001)

We study the one-electron spectral properties of one-dimensional interacting electron systems in which the interactions have finite range. We employ a mobile quantum impurity scheme that describes the interactions of the fractionalized excitations at energies above the standard Tomonga-Luttinger liquid limit and show that the phase shifts induced by the impurity describe universal properties of the one-particle spectral function. We find the explicit forms in terms of these phase shifts for the momentum dependent exponents that control the behavior of the spectral function near and at the (k,omega)-plane singularities where most of the spectral weight is located. The universality arises because the line shape near the singularities is independent of the short-distance part of the interaction potentials. For the class of potentials considered here, the charge fractionalized particles have screened Coulomb interactions that decay with a power-law exponent l>5. We apply the theory to the angle-resolved photo-electron spectroscopy (ARPES) in the highly one-dimensional bismuth-induced anisotropic structure on indium antimonide Bi/InSb(001). Our theoretical predictions agree quantitatively with both (i) the experimental value found in Bi/InSb(001) for the exponent alpha that controls the suppression of the density of states at very small excitation energy omega and (ii) the location in the (k,omega) plane of the experimentally observed high-energy peaks in the ARPES momentum and energy distributions. We conclude with a discussion of experimental properties beyond the range of our present theoretical framework and further open questions regarding the one-electron spectral properties of Bi/InSb(001).

Dissecting reaction calculations using halo effective field theory and ab initio input

We present a description of the break-up of halo nuclei in peripheral nuclear reactions by coupling a model of the projectile motivated by Halo Effective Field Theory with a fully dynamical treatment of the reaction using the Dynamical Eikonal Approximation. Our description of the halo system reproduces its long-range properties, i.e., binding energy and asymptotic normalization coefficients of bound states and phase shifts of continuum states. As an application we consider the break-up of 11Be in collisions on Pb and C targets. Taking the input for our Halo-EFT-inspired description of 11Be from a recent ab initio calculation of that system yields a good description of the Coulomb-dominated breakup on Pb at energies up to about 2 MeV, with the result essentially independent of the short-distance part of the halo wave function. However, the nuclear dominated break-up on C is more sensitive to short-range physics. The role of spectroscopic factors and possible extensions of our approach to include additional short-range mechanisms are also discussed.

Electromagnetic Structure of Two- and Three-Nucleon Systems: An Effective Field Theory Description

I discuss the use of chiral effective field theory (χEFT) to describe electromagnetic reactions in the two- and three-nucleon systems. I review the results of χEFT power counting for charge and current operators up to [Formula: see text] relative to leading order, before showing that renormalization-group arguments imply that short-distance electromagnetic operators play a larger role than suggested by this standard counting. A detailed examination of χEFT's predictions for the electromagnetic form factors of deuterium and the trinucleons, and for the threshold captures np→dγ and nd→tγ, enables a critical appraisal of the theory's performance in these contexts. Recent χEFT calculations using the [Formula: see text] chiral perturbation theory (χPT) potential yielded both form factors that agree with experimental data for Q2<0.25 GeV2 and an excellent description of the challenging threshold captures. Short-distance M1 operators are essential to this success, and the addition of a short-distance part of the nucleon–nucleon charge operator produces precise predictions of the deuteron charge and quadrupole form factors in this kinematic domain.

Prospects for a lattice computation of rare kaon decay amplitudes. II.K→πνν¯decays

The rare kaon decays $K\to\pi\nu\bar{\nu}$ are strongly suppressed in the standard model and widely regarded as processes in which new phenomena, not predicted by the standard model, may be observed. Recognizing such new phenomena requires precise standard model prediction for the braching ratio of $K\to\pi\nu\bar{\nu}$ with controlled uncertainty for both short-distance and long-distance contributions. In this work we demonstrate the feasibility of lattice QCD calculation of the long-distance contribution to rare kaon decays with the emphasis on $K^+\to\pi^+\nu\bar{\nu}$. Our methodology covers the calculation of both $W$-$W$ and $Z$-exchange diagrams. We discuss the estimation of the power-law, finite-volume corrections and two methods to consistently combine the long distance contribution determined by the lattice methods outlined here with the short distance parts that can be reliably determined using perturbation theory. It is a subsequent work of our first methodology paper on $K\to\pi\ell^+\ell^-$, where the focus was made on the $\gamma$-exchange diagrams.

A model of charmed baryon–nucleon potential and two- and three-body bound states with charmed baryon

A potential model for the interaction between a charmed baryon ($\Lambda_c$, $\Sigma_c$, and $\Sigma_c^*$) and the nucleon ($N$) is constructed. The model contains a long-range meson ($\pi$ and $\sigma$) exchange part and a short-distance quark exchange part. The quark cluster model is used to evaluate the short-range repulsion and a monopole type form factor is introduced to the long-range potential to reflect the extended structure of hadrons. We determine the cutoff parameters in the form factors by fitting the $NN$ scattering data with the same approach and we obtain four sets of parameters (a -- d). The most attractive potential (d) leads to bound $\Lambda_c N$ states with $J^\pi= 0^+$ and $1^+$ once the channel couplings among $\Lambda_c$, $\Sigma_c$ and $\Sigma_c^*$ are taken into account. One can also investigate many-body problems with the model. Here, we construct an effective $\Lambda_c N$ one-channel potential with the parameter set (d) and apply it to the 3-body $\Lambda_c NN$ system. The bound states with $J=1/2$ and $3/2$ are predicted.

Non-relativistic pair annihilation of nearly mass degenerate neutralinos and charginos III. Computation of the Sommerfeld enhancements

This paper concludes the presentation of the non-relativistic effective field theory formalism designed to calculate the radiative corrections that enhance the pair-annihilation cross sections of slowly moving neutralinos and charginos within the general minimal supersymmetric standard model (MSSM). While papers I and II focused on the computation of the tree-level annihilation rates that feed into the short-distance part, here we describe in detail the method to obtain the Sommerfeld factors that contain the enhanced long-distance corrections. This includes the computation of the potential interactions in the MSSM, which are provided in compact analytic form, and a novel solution of the multi-state Schr\"odinger equation that is free from the numerical instabilities generated by large mass splittings between the scattering states. Our results allow for a precise computation of the MSSM neutralino dark matter relic abundance and pair-annihilation rates in the present Universe, when Sommerfeld enhancements are important.