Resolved Photon Processes: A Tribute to Rohini Godbole

Abstract

Hadrons are particles composed of elementary quarks and gluons, which have strong interactions described by Quantum Chromodynamics (QCD); examples are protons and neutrons, which bind to form atomic nuclei. In contrast, photons are usually thought of as the elementary force carriers of quantum electrodynamics (QED). However, at the quantum level a photon can fluctuate into a quark antiquark pair. At sufficiently high energies these virtual quarks can become real, physical particles by interacting with other particles, in particular with other hadrons. In this way photons with energies exceeding a few GeV acquire properties of a hadron. Resolved photon processes are reactions that probe these hadronic properties. These processes often dominate the production of hadronic final states, including jets (sprays of collimated hadrons), at electron--proton and electron--positron colliders. Implications of this for backgrounds at future high--energy lepton colliders remain poorly understood.