Contributor info: Dr Yannick Ulrich

Riccardo Aliberti, Paolo Beltrame, Ettore Budassi, Carlo M. Carloni Calame, Gilberto Colangelo, Lorenzo Cotrozzi, Achim Denig, Anna Driutti, Tim Engel, Lois Flower, Andrea Gurgone, Martin Hoferichter, Fedor Ignatov, Sophie Kollatzsch, Bastian Kubis, Andrzej Kupść, Fabian Lange, Alberto Lusiani, Stefan E. Müller, Jérémy Paltrinieri, Pau Petit Rosàs, Fulvio Piccinini, Alan Price, Lorenzo Punzi, Marco Rocco, Olga Shekhovtsova, Andrzej Siódmok, Adrian Signer, Giovanni Stagnitto, Peter Stoffer, Thomas Teubner, William J. Torres Bobadilla, Francesco P. Ucci, Yannick Ulrich, Graziano Venanzoni

SciPost Phys. Comm. Rep. 9 (2025) · published 25 June 2025 | Toggle abstract · pdf

We present the results of Phase I of an ongoing review of Monte Carlo tools relevant for low-energy hadronic cross sections. This includes a detailed comparison of Monte Carlo codes for electron–positron scattering into a muon pair, pion pair, and electron pair, for scan and radiative-return experiments. After discussing the various approaches that are used and effects that are included, we show differential cross sections obtained with AfkQed, BabaYaga@NLO, KKMC, MCGPJ, McMule, Phokhara, and Sherpa, for scenarios that are inspired by experiments providing input for the dispersive evaluation of the hadronic vacuum polarisation.

J. M. Campbell, M. Diefenthaler, T. J. Hobbs, S. Höche, J. Isaacson, F. Kling, S. Mrenna, J. Reuter, S. Alioli, J. R. Andersen, C. Andreopoulos, A. M. Ankowski, E. C. Aschenauer, A. Ashkenazi, M. D. Baker, J. L. Barrow, M. van Beekveld, G. Bewick, S. Bhattacharya, C. Bierlich, E. Bothmann, P. Bredt, A. Broggio, A. Buckley, A. Butter, J. M. Butterworth, E. P. Byrne, C. M. Carloni-Calame, S. Chakraborty, X. Chen, M. Chiesa, J. T. Childers, J. Cruz-Martinez, J. Currie, N. Darvishi, M. Dasgupta, A. Denner, F. A. Dreyer, S. Dytman, B. K. El-Menoufi, T. Engel, S. Ferrario Ravasio, D. Figueroa, L. Flower, J. R. Forshaw, R. Frederix, A. Friedland, S. Frixione, H. Gallagher, K. Gallmeister, S. Gardiner, R. Gauld, J. Gaunt, A. Gavardi, T. Gehrmann, A. Gehrmann-De Ridder, L. Gellersen, W. Giele, S. Gieseke, F. Giuli, E. W. N. Glover, M. Grazzini, A. Grohsjean, C. Gütschow, K. Hamilton, T. Han, R. Hatcher, G. Heinrich, I. Helenius, O. Hen, V. Hirschi, M. Höfer, J. Holguin, A. Huss, P. Ilten, S. Jadach, A. Jentsch, S. P. Jones, W. Ju, S. Kallweit, A. Karlberg, T. Katori, M. Kerner, W. Kilian, M. M. Kirchgaeßer, S. Klein, M. Knobbe, C. Krause, F. Krauss, J. Lang, J. -N. Lang, G. Lee, S. W. Li, M. A. Lim, J. M. Lindert, D. Lombardi, L. Lönnblad, M. Löschner, N. Lurkin, Y. Ma, P. Machado, V. Magerya, A. Maier, I. Majer, F. Maltoni, M. Marcoli, G. Marinelli, M. R. Masouminia, P. Mastrolia, O. Mattelaer, J. Mazzitelli, J. McFayden, R. Medves, P. Meinzinger, J. Mo, P. F. Monni, G. Montagna, T. Morgan, U. Mosel, B. Nachman, P. Nadolsky, R. Nagar, Z. Nagy, D. Napoletano, P. Nason, T. Neumann, L. J. Nevay, O. Nicrosini, J. Niehues, K. Niewczas, T. Ohl, G. Ossola, V. Pandey, A. Papadopoulou, A. Papaefstathiou, G. Paz, M. Pellen, G. Pelliccioli, T. Peraro, F. Piccinini, L. Pickering, J. Pires, W. Placzek, S. Plätzer, T. Plehn, S. Pozzorini, S. Prestel, C. T. Preuss, A. C. Price, S. Quackenbush, E. Re, D. Reichelt, L. Reina, C. Reuschle, P. Richardson, M. Rocco, N. Rocco, M. Roda, A. Rodriguez Garcia, S. Roiser, J. Rojo, L. Rottoli, G. P. Salam, M. Schönherr, S. Schuchmann, S. Schumann, R. Schürmann, L. Scyboz, M. H. Seymour, F. Siegert, A. Signer, G. Singh Chahal, A. Siódmok, T. Sjöstrand, P. Skands, J. M. Smillie, J. T. Sobczyk, D. Soldin, D. E. Soper, A. Soto-Ontoso, G. Soyez, G. Stagnitto, J. Tena-Vidal, O. Tomalak, F. Tramontano, S. Trojanowski, Z. Tu, S. Uccirati, T. Ullrich, Y. Ulrich, M. Utheim, A. Valassi, A. Verbytskyi, R. Verheyen, M. Wagman, D. Walker, B. R. Webber, L. Weinstein, O. White, J. Whitehead, M. Wiesemann, C. Wilkinson, C. Williams, R. Winterhalder, C. Wret, K. Xie, T-Z. Yang, E. Yazgan, G. Zanderighi, S. Zanoli, K. Zapp

SciPost Phys. 16, 130 (2024) · published 24 May 2024 | Toggle abstract · pdf

We provide an overview of the status of Monte-Carlo event generators for high-energy particle physics. Guided by the experimental needs and requirements, we highlight areas of active development, and opportunities for future improvements. Particular emphasis is given to physics models and algorithms that are employed across a variety of experiments. These common themes in event generator development lead to a more comprehensive understanding of physics at the highest energies and intensities, and allow models to be tested against a wealth of data that have been accumulated over the past decades. A cohesive approach to event generator development will allow these models to be further improved and systematic uncertainties to be reduced, directly contributing to future experimental success. Event generators are part of a much larger ecosystem of computational tools. They typically involve a number of unknown model parameters that must be tuned to experimental data, while maintaining the integrity of the underlying physics models. Making both these data, and the analyses with which they have been obtained accessible to future users is an essential aspect of open science and data preservation. It ensures the consistency of physics models across a variety of experiments.

Sophie Kollatzsch, Yannick Ulrich

SciPost Phys. 15, 104 (2023) · published 20 September 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

We present a fully differential calculation of lepton pair production, taking into account the dominant next-to-next-to-leading order QED corrections as well as next-to-leading order electroweak and polarisation effects. We include all lepton masses, hard photon emission, as well as non-perturbative hadronic corrections. The corresponding matrix elements are implemented in the Monte Carlo framework McMule. In order to obtain a numerically stable implementation, we extend next-to-soft stabilisation, a universal technique based on a next-to-leading-power expansion, to calculations with polarised leptons. As an example, we show results tailored to the Belle II detector with the current setup as well as a potential future configuration that includes polarised beams.

Pulak Banerjee, Antonio Coutinho, Tim Engel, Andrea Gurgone, Adrian Signer, Yannick Ulrich

SciPost Phys. 15, 021 (2023) · published 21 July 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

We present an improved theoretical prediction of the positron energy spectrum for the polarised Michel decay $\mu^+\to e^+ \nu_e\bar{\nu}_\mu$. In addition to the full next-to-next-to-leading order correction of order $\alpha^2$ in the electromagnetic coupling, we include logarithmically enhanced terms at even higher orders. Logarithms due to collinear emission are included at next-to-leading accuracy up to order $\alpha^4$. At the endpoint of the Michel spectrum, soft photon emission results in large logarithms that are resummed up to next-to-next-to-leading logarithmic accuracy. We apply our results in the context of the MEG II and Mu3e experiments to estimate the impact of the theory error on the branching ratio sensitivity for the lepton-flavour-violating decay $\mu^+\to e^+ X$ of a muon into an axion-like particle $X$.

P. Banerjee, T. Engel, A. Signer, Y. Ulrich

SciPost Phys. 9, 027 (2020) · published 31 August 2020 | Toggle abstract · pdf

McMule is a framework for fully differential higher-order QED calculations of scattering and decay processes involving leptons. It keeps finite lepton masses, which regularises collinear singularities. Soft singularities are treated with dimensional regularisation and using FKS$^\ell$ subtraction. We describe the implementation of the framework in Fortran 95, list the processes that are currently implemented, and give instructions on how to run the code. In addition, we present new phenomenological results for muon-electron scattering and lepton-proton scattering, including the dominant NNLO corrections. While the applications presented focus on MUonE, MUSE, and P2, the code can be used for a large number of planned and running experiments.