Heavy flavor production at large transverse momentum through the boson-gluon fusion mechanism

Abstract
We present alternative calculations of the matrix elements for the process of heavy flavor production through the γWZ-gluon fusion mechanisms in hard hadronic interactions. The expressions for the matrix elements squared have been implemented in the EUROJET Monte Carlo event generator providing a flexible tool to study event distributions for both partonic and hadronic final states. In case of a charged mediator, we find complete agreement between our O(α2αs) calculations and recent calculations by Zerwas et al. Results on the factorization of the O(α2αs) matrix elements, which allows an independent treatment of O(α2) and O(α2αs) contributions to cross sections, are presented as well. We have performed an analysis of the main heavy flavor sources in hadronic interactions and have studied their relative importance as a function of accelerator energies. Heavy flavor masses have been varied over a wide range of possible values. The pure QCD contributions dominate for only part of the parameter combinations, while the distinct event topology arising in boson-gluon fusion processes enhances the observability of heavy flavors. We briefly discuss implications of the fusion mechanisms for production of heavy E6 fermions.