Next-to-leading-order time-like rho electromagnetic form factors in ${k_{\rm T}}$ factorization

Abstract

We calculate the time-like $\rho$ electromagnetic (EM) form factor in the $k_T$ factorization formalism by including the next-to-leading-order (NLO) corrections of the leading-twist and sub-leading twist contributions. It's observed that the NLO correction to the magnitude of the LO leading-twist form factor is lower than $30\%$ at large invariant mass squared $Q^2 > 30 \text{GeV}^2$. It is found that the $\rho$ meson EM form factor is dominated by twist-3 contribution instead of by twist-2 one because of the end-point enhancement. The theoretical predictions of the moduli of three helicity amplitudes and total cross section are analyzed at $\sqrt{s}=10.58$ GeV, which are consistent with measurements from BABAR Collaboration.