Forward Z-boson production and the unintegrated sea quark density

Abstract

Drell-Yan production in the forward region at the Large Hadron Collider is sensitive to multiple radiation of QCD partons not collinearly ordered, emitted over large rapidity intervals. We propose a method to take account of these radiative contributions via a factorization formula which depends on the unintegrated, or transverse momentum dependent, splitting function associated with the evolution of the initial-state sea quark distribution. We analyze this formula numerically, and point out kinematic effects from the initial-state transverse momentum on the vector boson spectrum.