On the Resummation of Large QCD Logarithms in Higgs -> 2 Photons Decay

Abstract

We study the strong corrections to the Higgs coupling to two photons. This coupling is the dominant mechanism for Higgs production in photon-photon collisions. In addition, the two photon decay mode of the Higgs is an important and relatively background free channel of relevance at the LHC and the Tevatron. We develop a method for the resummation of large QCD corrections in the form of Sudakov-like logarithms of the type α_s^n\ln^{2n}(m/m_H) and α_s^n\ln^{2n-1}(m/m_H) (where m is the light quark mass) which can contribute to this process in certain models (for example, the MSSM for large tan β) up to next-to-leading-logarithmic (NLL) accuracy. The NLL correction is moderate, the substantial part of which comes from terms not related to running coupling effects.

13 pages, LaTeX, 5 Postscript Figures, version published in Phys. Rev. D