Analytical Soft Functions for Heavy-Quark Final States at Hadron Colliders

Abstract

We present the first computation of the complete two-loop, fully-differential soft function describing the production of a heavy-quark pair in association with a color-singlet system at hadron colliders. This result constitutes one of the most complex soft functions known to date and it is obtained in closed analytic form for generic multi-dimensional kinematics. This allows us to obtain novel analytic results for the transverse-momentum-dependent and threshold soft functions in this class of processes. We further obtain a decomposition of the soft function into dipole and tripole color correlators, thereby supplying essential building blocks for processes involving a heavy-quark pair produced together with additional light jets at both hadron and lepton colliders. These results represent a key ingredient for advancing precision predictions for heavy-quark physics at the LHC.

Figures (1)

• Figure 1: Examples for two-loop Feynman diagrams that contribute to the soft function.