From 2540 Z 0 → τ + τ − events, we determine the inclusive decay branching fractions of the τ -lepton into one and three charged particles to be 0.856 ± 0.006 (stat.) ± 0.003 (syst.) and 0.144 ± 0.006 (stat.) ± 0.003 (syst.), respectively. The leptonic branching fractions are measured to be 0.175 ± 0.008 (stat.) ± 0.005 (syst.) for τ → μν μ ντ and 0.177 ± 0.007 (stat.) ± 0.006 (syst.) for τ → eν e ν τ . We determined the τ lifetime both from three-prong decays using the decay length and from one-prong decays using the impact parameter. The results from the two independent methods agree and yield a combined value of [0.309 ± 0.023 (stat.) ± 0.030 (syst.)] × 10 −12 s.
ALPHAS extracted from the ratio of the branching fractions.
In four-jet events from e + e − →Z 0 →multihadrons one can separate the three principal contributions from the triple-gluon vertex, double gluon-bremsstrahlung and the secondary quark-antiquark production, using the shape of the two-dimensional angular distributions in the generalized Nachtmann-Reiter angle θ NR ∗ and the opening angle of the secondary jets. Thus one can identify directly the contribution from the triple-gluon vertex without comparison with a specific non-QCD model. Applying this new method to events taken with the DELPHI-detector we get for the ratio of the colour factor N c to the fermionic Casimir operator C F : N c C F = 2.55 ± 0.55 ( stat. ) ± 0.4 ( fragm. + models ) ± 0.2 ( error in bias ) in agreement with the value 2.25 expected in QCD from N c =3 and C F = 4 3 .
NC, CF, and TR are the color factors for SU(3) group.
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