Perturbative Heavy Quark Fragmentation Function through O(alpha_s^2)

Abstract

We derive the initial condition for the perturbative fragmentation function of a heavy quark through order O(alpha_s^2) in the MS-bar scheme. This initial condition is useful for computing heavy quark (or lepton, in case of QED) energy distributions from calculations with massless partons. In addition, the initial condition at O(alpha_s^2) can be used to resum collinear logarithms ln(Q^2/m^2) in heavy quark energy spectrum with next-to-next-to-leading logarithmic accuracy by solving the DGLAP equation.

Comments: 14 pages, uses axodraw.sty; minor clarifications in the text; Fig(1,2) corrected; references added