Distributions are presented of event shape variables, jet roduction rates and charged particle momenta obtained from 53 000 hadronicZ decays. They are compared to the predictions of the QCD+hadronization models JETSET, ARIADNE and HERWIG, and are used to optimize several model parameters. The JETSET and ARIADNE coherent parton shower (PS) models with running αs and string fragmentation yield the best description of the data. The HERWIG parton shower model with cluster fragmentation fits the data less well. The data are in better agreement with JETSET PS than with JETSETO(αS2) matrix elements (ME) even when the renormalization scale is optimized.
Sphericity distribution.
Sphericity distribution.
Aplanarity distribution.
Relative production rates of multijet hadronic final states of Z 0 boson decays, observed in e + e − annihilation around 91 GeV centre of mass energy, are presented. The data can be well described by analytic O( α s 2 ) QCD calculations and by QCD shower model calaculations with parameters as determined at lower energies. A first judgement of Λ MS and of the renormalization scale μ 2 in O( α s 2 ) QCD results in values similar to those obtained in the continuum of e + e − annihilations. Significant scaling violations are observed when the 3-jet fractions are compared to the corresponding results from smaller centre of mass energies. They can be interpreted as being entirely due tot the energy dependence of α s , as proposed by the nonabelian nature of QCD, The possibility of an energy independent coupling constant can be excluded with a significance of 5.7 standard deviations.
Data are corrected for final acceptance and resolution of the detector. No explicit corrections for hadronisation effects are applied.
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