2001/06/30 by Steven B. Giddings, Scott Thomas · 2 citations
Physics and Astronomy · #gr-qc #hep-ex #hep-ph #hep-th
paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physrevd.65.056010
published as Phys.Rev. D65 (2002) 056010 · Latex, 28 pages. v4: minor changes, largely to agree with published version; appendix added comparing conventions
arxiv created 2002/06/26 · arxiv updated 2009/11/30
If the fundamental Planck scale is of order a TeV, as the case in some extra-dimensions scenarios, future hadron colliders such as the Large Hadron Collider will be black hole factories. The non-perturbative process of black hole formation and decay by Hawking evaporation gives rise to spectacular events with up to many dozens of relatively hard jets and leptons, with a characteristic ratio of hadronic to leptonic activity of roughly 5:1. The total transverse energy of such events is typically a sizeable fraction of the beam energy. Perturbative hard scattering processes at energies well above the Planck scale are cloaked behind a horizon, thus limiting the ability to probe short distances. The high energy black hole cross section grows with energy at a rate determined by the dimensionality and geometry of the extra dimensions. This dependence therefore probes the extra dimensions at distances larger than the Planck scale.