An Effective Field Theory for Jet Processes

TL;DR

This paper develops an effective field theory framework for jet processes that systematically factorizes different energy scales and resums large logarithms, including non-global ones, in cone-jet events.

Contribution

It introduces a novel effective field theory incorporating soft, collinear, and collinear-soft degrees of freedom, providing the first factorization formula for cone-jet processes.

Findings

Derives a factorization formula for cone-jet processes.

Resums all logarithmically enhanced higher-order corrections.

Addresses non-global logarithms within the effective field theory.

Abstract

Processes involving narrow jets receive perturbative corrections enhanced by logarithms of the jet opening angle and the ratio of the energies inside and outside the jets. Analyzing cone-jet processes in effective field theory, we find that in addition to soft and collinear fields their description requires degrees of freedom which are simultaneously soft and collinear to the jets. These collinear-soft particles can resolve individual collinear partons, leading to a complicated multi-Wilson-line structure of the associated operators at higher orders. Our effective field theory provides, for the first time, a factorization formula for a cone-jet process, which fully separates the physics at different energy scales. Its renormalization-group equations control all logarithmically enhanced higher-order terms, in particular also the non-global logarithms.