Measurement of the Total Cross Section and Energy - Correlations for Electron-Positron Annihilation Into Hadrons at 29 GEV.
Abstract
This work describes measurements of the total cross section and the energy-energy correlation cross section for hadronic events produced in electron-positron annihilation at a center-of-mass energy of 29 GeV. The performance of the MAC detector at PEP, featuring total absorption calorimetry and charged particle tracking over nearly the full solid angle, is examined and found to meet the original design requirements. The unique and optimal features of MAC are fully exploited to reduce the systematics involved in both measurements, resulting in significant quantitative tests of the theory of quantum chromodynamics. Special attention is focussed on radiative corrections to the total cross section, which constitute a critical component of the acceptance determination, and for the first time the effects of higher order than (alpha)('3) QED processes are included. The total cross section measurement yields R = 3.91 with a total error of (+OR-)2.7%, an accuracy not previously attained by other experiments. For the energy-energy correlation cross section, the consequences of combining pure quantum chromodynamics with contrasting fragmentation models are explored and compared with the data, and result in different values for the strong coupling constant, (alpha)(,s) (TURNEQ) 0.13 (+OR-) 0.02 for incoherent jet formation and 0.24 (+OR-) 0.04 in the string model.
- Publication:
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Ph.D. Thesis
- Pub Date:
- 1983
- Bibcode:
- 1983PhDT........96H
- Keywords:
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- Physics: Elementary Particles and High Energy