The interaction of virtual photons is investigated using double tagged gammagamma events with hadronic final states recorded by the ALEPH experiment at e^+e^- centre-of-mass energies between 188 and 209 GeV. The measured cross section is compared to Monte Carlo models, and to next-to-leading-order QCD and BFKL calculations.
Differential cross section as a function of the relative energy of the scattered electrons.
Differential cross section as a function of the polar angle THETA of the scattered electrons.
Differential cross section as a function of the virtuality Q**2 of the photons.
Inclusive beauty-quark production in two-photon collisions has been measured at LEP using an integrated luminosity of 698 pb-1 collected by the ALEPH detector with sqrt(s) between 130 and 209 GeV. The b quarks were identified using lifetime information. The cross section is found to be sigma(e+ e- --> e+ e- b \bar{b} X) = (5.4 +/- 0.8 (stat) +/- 0.8 (syst)) pb which is consistent with Next-to-Leading Order QCD.
Cross section for the process E+ E- --> E+ E- BQUARK BQUARKBAR X.