NNLO evolution of deep-inelastic structure functions: the singlet case

2000/06/14 by W. L. van Neerven, A. Vogt · 3 citations
Physics and Astronomy · #hep-ph

paper · pdf · doi:10.1016/s0550-3213(00)00480-6

published as Nucl.Phys. B588 (2000) 345-373 · 31 pages, LaTeX, 14 eps-figures

arxiv created 2000/06/14 · arxiv updated 2009/11/30

Abstract

We study the next-to-next-to-leading order (NNLO) evolution of flavour singlet parton densities and structure functions in massless perturbative QCD. Present information on the corresponding three-loop splitting functions is used to derive parametrizations of these quantities, including Bjorken-x dependent estimates of their residual uncertainties. Compact expressions are also provided for the exactly known, but in part rather lengthy two-loop singlet coefficient functions. The size of the NNLO corrections and their effect on the stability under variations of the renormalization and mass-factorizations scales are investigated. Except for rather low values of the scales, the residual uncertainty of the three-loop splitting functions does not lead to relevant effects for x > 10^-3. Inclusion of the NNLO contributions considerably reduces the theoretical uncertainty of determinations of the quark and gluon densities from deep-inelastic structure functions.

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