Three-loop cusp anomalous dimension and a conjecture for $n$ loops

Abstract

I present analytical expressions for the cusp anomalous dimension in QCD through three loops in terms of elementary functions and ordinary polylogarithms. I observe interesting relations between the results at different loops and provide a conjecture for the $n$-loop cusp anomalous dimension in terms of the lower-loop results. I also present numerical results and simple approximate formulas for the cusp anomalous dimension relevant to top-quark production.

Comments: 16 pages, 5 figures; a new section has been added and several other additions/changes made in v2