A Study of the $$Q^{2}$$ Dependence of the QCD Coupling Constant from the Transverse Momentum of Jets in Deep Inelastic Muon Scattering

Thesis/Dissertation · Fri Jan 01 04:00:00 EST 1993

DOI:https://doi.org/10.2172/1425802· OSTI ID:1425802

Conrad, Janet Marie ^[1]

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1. Harvard U.

Experiment 665 at Fermilab is the first deep inelastic scattering experiment to obtain data in a kinematic range where jets can be identified on an event-by-event basis. In this thesis, using the average squared transverse momentum of the jets produced in deep inelastic muon scattering, a quantity is calculated which Perturbative QCD predicts to be equal to $$\alpha_3$$ the strong coupling constant. The quantity is studied as a function of $Q^2$, the negative 4-momentum squared of the virtual photon, for 3 < $Q^2$ < 25 $GeV^2$. The data a.re shown to be consistent with the predictions of PQCD with $$\Lambda ^{\eta_f = 4}_{DIS}$$ = 359 ± 31 (stat) ± 149 (sys) MeV. However this may have a significant theoretical error due to uncalculated higher order corrections. This thesis provides a detailed description of the characteristics of the identified jets. The transverse momentum due to fragmentation is measured to be ($$P^2_{\tau}frag$$) = 0.0820 ±0.002(stat) ±0.005(sys). Using naive assumptions about the jets, the intrinsic transverse momentum is measured to be ($$k^2_{\tau}$$) = 0.27 ±0.01 (stat) ±0.03 (sys) Gev·2

• Research Organization: Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (FNAL), Batavia, IL (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE Office of Science (SC), High Energy Physics (HEP) (SC-25)
• DOE Contract Number: AC02-07CH11359
• OSTI ID: 1425802
• Report Number(s): FERMILAB-THESIS-1993-35; UMI-93-18661; 364093
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS