We report on a search for new quarks in hadronic Z° decays. From the event shape analysis of a data sample containing 2185 multihadronic annihilation events, we observe no evidence for the top or b' quarks. We derive limits for the top and b' quark masses under the assumption of various possible standard model and non-standard model decay schemes. Our search is sensitive to quark masses larger than 23 GeV/ c 2 ; it yields the following lower limits at a 95% confidence level: 44.5 GeV/ c 2 for the top quark mass and 45.2 GeV/ c 2 for the b′ quark mass.
Measured event shape distributions - uncorrected.
The jet character of the hadronic final states produced ine+e− annihilations is studied in terms of jet measures such as thrust, sphericity, jet opening angle and jet masses, in the energy range 7.7 to 31.6 GeV. All distributions and averages have been corrected for detector effects and initial state radiation. The energy dependence of the averages of these jet quantities is used to estimate the contributions due to perturbative QCD and fragmentation effects. Correlations between the jet measures and the multiplicity of charged hadrons are also presented.
DIFFERENTIAL THRUST DISTRIBUTIONS WHERE THRUST IS MAX(SUM(ABS(PLONG))/SUM(ABS(P))).
MEAN THRUST VALUES AS A FUNCTION OF CM ENERGY.
DIFFERENTIAL SPERICITY DISTRIBUTIONS WHERE SPHERICITY IS 3/2*MIN(SUM(PT**2)/SUM(ABS(P))).