Two-photon exchange effects in $e^+e^- \rightarrow \pi^+\pi^-$ and time-like pion electromagnetic form factor

TL;DR

This paper investigates two-photon exchange effects in electron-positron to pion pair production at high momentum transfer using perturbative QCD, highlighting asymmetries in cross sections and revisiting the pion electromagnetic form factor.

Contribution

It provides a detailed analysis of TPE effects including twist-2 and twist-3 DAs, and compares the time-like pion form factor results with previous studies.

Findings

TPE effects cause asymmetry in differential cross section.

Revised calculations of the time-like pion electromagnetic form factor.

Potential for experimental tests of pQCD at high momentum transfer.

Abstract

The two-photon-exchange (TPE) effects in the process $e^+e^- \rightarrow \pi^+\pi^-$ at large momentum transfer are discussed within the perturbative QCD (pQCD). The contributions from the twist-2 and twist-3 distribution amplitudes (DAs) of pion are considered in the estimation. Different with the results under the one-photon-exchange (OPE) approximation, the TPE effects result in an asymmetry of the differential cross section on the scattering angle. The precise measurement of this asymmetry by the further experiment is an precise test of pQCD at large momentum transfer. The time-like electromagnetic form factor of pion at the leading order of pQCD is re-discussed and the comparison of our results with those in the references are presented.