Inclusive jet cross sections in the Breit frame in neutral current deep inelastic scattering at HERA and determination of α s

Abstract

Inclusive jet differential cross sections have been measured in neutral current deep inelastic e +p scattering for boson virtualities Q 2 > 125 GeV 2. The data were taken using the ZEUS detector at HERA and correspond to an integrated luminosity of 38.6 pb -1. Jets were identified in the Breit frame using the longitudinally invariant k T cluster algorithm. Measurements of differential inclusive jet cross sections are presented as functions of jet transverse energy (E B T.jet), jet pseudorapidity and Q 2, for jets with E B T.jet > 8 GeV. Next-to-leading-order QCD calculations agree well with the measurements both at high Q 2 and high E B T.jet. The value of α s(M z), determined from an analysis of dσ/dQ 2 for Q 2 > 500 GeV 2, is α s(M Z=0.1212±0.0017 (stat.) +0.0023 -0.0031 (syst.) +0.0028 -0.0027(th.). © 2002 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.