Testing QCD with hypothetical tau leptons
Date
1999Source
Physical Review D - Particles, Fields, Gravitation and CosmologyVolume
60Issue
3Pages
037501.1-037501.4Google Scholar check
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We construct new phenomenological tests of perturbative QCD by considering a hypothetical τ lepton of arbitrary mass which decays hadronically through the electromagnetic current. Its hadronic branching ratio can be computed directly as an integral over the e+e- annihilation cross section ratio, Re+e-. More generally, we can design a set of commensurate scale relations which test the applicability and self-consistency of leading twist QCD predictions by varying the weight function away from the form associated with the V-A decay of the physical τ. This method allows the wide range of Re+e- data (or other similar observables which define an effective charge) to be used as renormalization scheme and scale invariant probes of QCD. ©1999 The American Physical Society.