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# LPENSL-TH 03/2001 The Fuzzy Sphere ⋆-Product and Spin Networks

## 1 Introduction

This paper originated from an observation that manipulating with functions on the fuzzy sphere is equivalent to manipulating with certain $`\mathrm{SU}(2)`$ spin networks. Although this observation is nothing more than a reinterpretation of the construction  of non-commutative sphere spherical harmonics, it does bring spin networks of Penrose  into the subject of non-commutative geometry, and is thus interesting as providing an unusual perspective on non-commutative manifolds.

In this paper we would like to illustrate the usage of spin networks by deriving some facts about the non-commutative product on the fuzzy sphere. The fuzzy sphere of  gives one of the simplest examples of non-commutative spaces. Its structure is, in a sense, even simpler than that of the usual non-commutative plane, for the algebra of functions on the fuzzy sphere is finite dimensional, unlike in the case of the plane. On the other hand, as we shall see, the structure of the $``$-product in this case is much more complicated.

In  the fuzzy sphere is constructed replacing the algebra of polynomials on the sphere by the non-commutative algebra generated by Pauli matrices taken in a fixed irreducible representation of $`\mathrm{SU}(2)`$. More precisely, the algebra of functions from $`L^2(S^2)`$ is thought of as the algebra of polynomials in $`x_i^3`$ modulo the relation $`x^2=1`$. We set the radius of the sphere to be $`1`$. One then quantizes the coordinates $`x_i`$ via:

$$x_i\widehat{X}^i:=\frac{\widehat{J}^i}{\sqrt{\frac{N}{2}(\frac{N}{2}+1)}},$$
(1.1)
where $`\widehat{J}^i`$ are the generators of $`𝔰u(2)`$, satisfying $`[\widehat{J}^i,\widehat{J}^j]=iϵ^{ijk}\widehat{J}^k`$, taken in the $`(N+1)`$-dimensional irreducible representation of $`\mathrm{SU}(2)`$. The factor in (1.1) is adjusted precisely in such a way that the “quantized” coordinates $`\widehat{X}^i`$ square to one. The rule (1.1) gives quantization of the monomials of order one in coordinates. Monomials of order up to $`N`$ are quantized by replacing the products of the coordinates $`x_i`$ by the symmetrized products of matrices $`\widehat{X}^i`$ (see more on this map in Section 3). Monomials of order $`(N+1)`$ and higher become linearly dependent of lower order monomials, so that the algebra of functions on the fuzzy sphere is finite-dimensional. The integral over $`S^2`$ is replaced by the trace:

$$_{S^2}\frac{1}{(N+1)}\mathrm{Tr}.$$
(1.2)
When $`1/N`$, which plays the role of the parameter of non-commutativity, is taken to zero, the commutator of $`\widehat{X}^i`$ vanishes, and the algebra of functions on the non-commutative sphere reduces to the commutative algebra. The trace (1.2) then reduces to the usual integral. It is in this sense that the fuzzy sphere reduces to the usual $`S^2`$ when the non-commutativity parameter is sent to zero. For more details on this construction see, e.g, .

In practice one would like to have a more explicit description of the above quantization map. In particular, any function on the sphere can be decomposed into the basis of spherical harmonics, and one would like to know the matrices into which the spherical harmonics are sent under the quantization map. This was described in , where it was realized that the components of these matrices are given by certain Clebsch-Gordan coefficients. Interestingly, the work  appeared before the introduction of the notion of fuzzy sphere in , and contained essentially all the ingredients of the construction.

Let us now explain why one should expect the appearance of Clebsch-Gordan coefficients, or $`3j`$-symbols, as the result of the quantization map. Consider the following simple chain of isomorphisms:

$$\mathrm{End}(V^{\frac{N}{2}})V^{\frac{N}{2}}\times (V^{\frac{N}{2}})^{}_{l=1}^NV^l.$$
(1.3)
Here $`V^l`$ is the space of the irreducible representation of $`\mathrm{SU}(2)`$ of the dimension $`(2l+1)`$. The Clebsch-Gordan coefficients relate a basis on the right hand side of (1.3) to a basis on the left hand side. A particular basis in $`V^l`$ is given by the usual spherical harmonics $`Y_{lm}(\theta ,\varphi )`$. Thus, the isomorphism in (1.3) implies that every $`Y_{lm},lN`$ must be representable as an element of $`\mathrm{End}(V^{\frac{N}{2}})`$, that is, as an $`(N+1)\times (N+1)`$ matrix. The components of this matrix are given by the corresponding Clebsch-Gordan coefficients. We shall write down the corresponding formulas in the next section.

The appearance of the Clebsch-Gordan coefficients, or $`3j`$-symbols, as components of the matrices representing the spherical harmonics indicates that spin networks must play some role. Indeed, spin networks are exactly the quantities constructed from $`3j`$-symbols, corresponding to their vertices, with their indices contracted in some way, the contraction being represented by the spin network edges. As we shall see, the problem of calculation of the non-commutative analog of the integral of a product of a number of spherical harmonics always reduces to the evaluation of a particular spin network. One of the goals of the present paper is to develop the corresponding techniques. We do this by studying in some detail the $``$-product on the fuzzy sphere.

Our paper partially overlaps with work . In particular, the formula for the $``$-product on the fuzzy sphere in terms of the $`6j`$-symbol is also contained in . What is new in this paper is the expression for the expansion of this $``$-product in powers of the non-commutativity parameter. Our approach also allows us to clarify the link between the fuzzy sphere product and the deformation quantization $``$-product.

## 2 Setup

Under the quantization map the spherical harmonics $`Y_{lm}(x),xS^2`$ are mapped into certain $`(N+1)\times (N+1)`$ matrices, and, as we explained in the introduction, the components of these matrices are given by the Clebsch-Gordan coefficients. Before we spell out what these matrices are, let us fix our conventions as to what basis of spherical harmonics is used. Let us introduce, for integer $`l`$,

$$\overline{\mathrm{\Theta }}_m^l(x):=i^ml,m|T_g|\omega ,$$
(2.1)
where bar denotes the complex conjugation, $`|l,m`$ form a highest weight normalized basis in the irreducible representation of the dimension $`(2l+1)`$, and $`|\omega `$ is the vector (unique up to a phase) that is invariant under the action of some fixed $`\mathrm{SO}(2)`$ subgroup of $`\mathrm{SO}(3)`$. It is given by $`|\omega =|l,0`$. Then (2.1) is a function on the homogeneous space $`\mathrm{SO}(3)/\mathrm{SO}(2)S^2`$. Using the formula (A.1) for the integral of the product of two matrix elements, one gets the orthogonality relation for $`\mathrm{\Theta }`$:

$$_{S^2}𝑑x\overline{\mathrm{\Theta }}_m^l\mathrm{\Theta }_m^{}^l^{}=\frac{\delta ^{ll^{}}\delta _{mm^{}}}{\mathrm{dim}_l},$$
(2.2)
where $`dx`$ is the normalized measure on the sphere. The presence of the factor of $`\mathrm{dim}_l=(2l+1)`$ in this formula (and also the usage of the normalized measure $`dx`$) is what makes our $`\mathrm{\Theta }_m^l`$ different from the usual spherical harmonics $`Y_{lm}`$. The basis (2.1) satisfies:

$$\overline{\mathrm{\Theta }}_m^l=(1)^m\mathrm{\Theta }_m^l.$$
(2.3)
Note that the same relation is satisfied by the usual $`Y_{lm}`$, so our basis is indeed only different by a normalization.

Along with the orthogonality relation (2.2), we will need the value of the integral of the product of three spherical harmonics. It is easily computed using the formula (A.2) for the integral of the product of three matrix elements and the definition (2.1) of the spherical harmonics. We have:

$$_{S^2}𝑑x\overline{\mathrm{\Theta }_{m_3}^{l_3}(x)}\mathrm{\Theta }_{m_1}^{l_1}(x)\mathrm{\Theta }_{m_2}^{l_2}(x)=\overline{\widehat{C}_{\mathrm{0\hspace{0.17em}0\hspace{0.17em}0}}^{l_3l_1l_2}}\widehat{C}_{m_3m_1m_2}^{l_3l_1l_2}.$$
(2.4)
Here $`\widehat{C}`$ are Clebsch-Gordan coefficients, and we have used the fact that the right hand side is only non-zero when $`m_1+m_2=m_3`$. Our choice of the normalization for Clebsch-Gordan’s is such that the so-called theta-symbol is always equal to one, see (2.12). For reference, let us mention that our coefficients $`\widehat{C}^l`$ are given by $`1/\sqrt{\mathrm{dim}_l}`$ times the Clebsch-Gordan coefficients used by Vilenkin and Klimyk . The “hat” over the symbol of the coefficient is used precisely to indicate this difference in normalizations. It is now not hard to see that (2.4), together with (2.2), implies that:

$$\mathrm{\Theta }_{m_1}^{l_1}(x)\mathrm{\Theta }_{m_2}^{l_2}(x)=\underset{l_3=|l_1l_2|}{\overset{l_1+l_2}{}}\underset{m_3}{}\mathrm{dim}_{l_3}\widehat{\mathrm{\Theta }}_{m_3}^{l_3}(x)\overline{\widehat{C}_{\mathrm{0\hspace{0.17em}0\hspace{0.17em}0}}^{l_3l_1l_2}}\widehat{C}_{m_3m_1m_2}^{l_3l_1l_2}.$$
(2.5)
Note that, in this formula, the commutativity of the product comes from the symmetry relations for the Clebsch-Gordan, namely:

$$\widehat{C}_{m_3m_2m_1}^{l_3l_2l_1}=(1)^{l_3l_1l_2}\widehat{C}_{m_3m_1m_2}^{l_3l_1l_2}.$$
(2.6)
The group $`\mathrm{SO}(3)`$ acts on functions on $`S^2`$ by left shifts $`T_gf(x)=f(g^1x)`$, and the functions $`\mathrm{\Theta }_m^l(x)`$ for fixed $`l`$ span the vector space $`V^l`$, in which the representation by shifts is irreducible. In view of the isomorphisms (1.3), functions $`\mathrm{\Theta }_m^l(x),lN`$ can be mapped to $`(N+1)\times (N+1)`$ matrices, whose components must be given by Clebsch-Gordan coefficients. These matrices are:

$$[\widehat{\mathrm{\Theta }}_m^l]_{ij}=\sqrt{N+1}\widehat{C}_{mij}^{l\frac{N}{2}\frac{N}{2}^{}},$$
(2.7)
where $`\widehat{C}_{mij}^{l\frac{N}{2}\frac{N}{2}^{}}`$ are Clebsch-Gordan coefficients with properties:

$`{\displaystyle \underset{mij}{}}\overline{\widehat{C}_{mij}^{l\frac{N}{2}\frac{N}{2}^{}}}\widehat{C}_{mij}^{l\frac{N}{2}\frac{N}{2}^{}}=1`$ (2.8)
$`\overline{\widehat{C}_{mji}^{l\frac{N}{2}\frac{N}{2}^{}}}=(1)^m\widehat{C}_{mij}^{l\frac{N}{2}\frac{N}{2}^{}}.`$ (2.9)
Here $`(N/2)^{}`$ is the conjugate representation to $`N/2`$. The first of these properties is the normalization condition that will be explained below, while the second is the “quantum” analog:

$$(\widehat{\mathrm{\Theta }}_m^l)^{}=\widehat{\overline{\mathrm{\Theta }_m^l}}$$
(2.10)
of the classical property (2.3).

We are now in the position to introduce the graphic notations that will lead us to spin networks and somewhat explain the normalization choices made above. We shall denote the Clebsch-Gordan’s by a tri-valent vertex, with its three edges representing the three pairs of indices of $`\widehat{C}`$, so that

$$[\widehat{\mathrm{\Theta }}_m^l]_{ij}=\sqrt{N+1}\text{}$$
(2.11)
Each edge corresponds to a pair of indices: an irreducible representation (spin) and a basis vector in this representation. If no spin is indicated, as for the bottom edges in (2.11), then $`N/2`$ is assumed. Edges are oriented. The operation of complex conjugation is represented by changing the orientation of all the edges. The origin of the graphic notation (2.11) is evident: the Clebsch-Gordan coefficients it represents are just the matrix elements of the intertwiner between the tensor product of $`V^{\frac{N}{2}}\times (V^{\frac{N}{2}})^{}`$ and the representation $`V^l`$; this intertwiner is represented by a trivalent vertex.

Using the graphical notation introduced, the normalization condition (2.8) is the statement about the value of the so-called theta graph:

$$\text{}=1.$$
(2.12)
This graph is constructed taking the product of two $`3j`$-symbols and summing over the “internal” indices, as in (2.8). The theta graph is the simplest spin network, and the $`3j`$ symbols we use are normalized in precisely such a way that the value of this graph is always one.

As we mentioned in the Introduction, for the non-commutative sphere, the integral over $`S^2`$ goes into the trace. Let us now find the quantum analog of the orthogonality relation (2.2). The corresponding quantity is graphically represented as:

$$\frac{1}{N+1}\mathrm{Tr}\left(\widehat{\mathrm{\Theta }}_m^l\right)^{}\widehat{\mathrm{\Theta }}_m^{}^l^{}=\text{}$$
(2.13)
Here $``$ denotes the operation of taking the Hermitian conjugation, and its effect is exactly such that all “internal” indices are contracted as in the above diagram. Now using the elementary fact that:

$$\text{}=\frac{1}{\mathrm{dim}_l}\text{}\text{}$$
(2.14)
where the straight line represents the matrix element of the intertwiner between representations $`l`$ and $`l^{}`$, that is, the product of Kronecker deltas, we see that the “quantum” spherical harmonics $`\widehat{\mathrm{\Theta }}`$ satisfy exactly the same orthogonality relation (2.2) as the classical ones. The factor of $`\sqrt{N+1}`$ in (2.7) was adjusted precisely in such a way that this property holds.

We hope that the reader has already started appreciating the convenience of the graphical notations. Using these notations, complicated expressions are calculated by using elementary facts from representation theory. Thus, the property (2.14) is proved by noticing that the left hand side of this equation is an intertwiner between representations $`l`$ and $`l^{}`$. Such an intertwiner only exists when $`l=l^{}`$, which means that the result must be proportional to the straight line. The proportionality coefficient can be calculated by taking the trace of the whole expression, which is graphically represented by “closing” the open ends of the diagram. Performing this operation on the left hand side, one gets the theta graph. The right hand side gives the loop, whose value is just the dimension of the corresponding representation. We shall see other examples of such proofs in the sequel.

Let us now, before we go to our discussion of the $``$-product on the fuzzy sphere, prove that the quantization rule (2.7) does give the correct quantization of the sphere, that is, the one given by (1.1). To this end, we must calculate the commutator of the non-commuting coordinates $`\widehat{X}^i`$. Recall that classically the coordinates $`x_i`$ are just the spherical harmonics corresponding to $`l=1`$:

$`x_1={\displaystyle \frac{1}{\sqrt{2}}}(\mathrm{\Theta }_1^1\mathrm{\Theta }_1^1),x_2={\displaystyle \frac{1}{i\sqrt{2}}}(\mathrm{\Theta }_1^1+\mathrm{\Theta }_1^1),x_3=\mathrm{\Theta }_0^1.`$ (2.15)
In the quantum case we replace the harmonics $`\mathrm{\Theta }^1`$ by the corresponding matrices (2.7). We then must have:

$$[\widehat{X}^i,\widehat{X}^j]=iϵ^{ijk}\widehat{X}^k\frac{1}{\sqrt{\frac{N}{2}(\frac{N}{2}+1)}}.$$
(2.16)
Let us show that this property indeed holds. We have:

$$\frac{1}{N+1}[\widehat{X}^i,\widehat{X}^j]=\text{}\text{}$$
(2.17)
where the spin $`1`$ is assumed on the vertical lines, and

$$\frac{1}{(N+1)^{3/2}}\mathrm{Tr}\left((\widehat{X}^k)^{}[\widehat{X}^i,\widehat{X}^j]\right)=\text{}\text{}=2\text{}\text{}$$
(2.18)
To get the last equality we used the fact that each of the two terms is an intertwiner from a single representation of spin 1 to the tensor product of two such representations. Such an intertwiner must be proportional to the unique intertwiner that is given by the tri-valent vertex on the right hand side of (2.18). The proportionality coefficient is easily determined by closing all the open edges, and is given by the $`6j`$-symbol on the right hand side. The second term equals minus the first one see (2.5), which explains the factor of $`2`$. The $`3j`$-symbol is given by:

$$\text{}=\frac{(i)}{\sqrt{3!}}ϵ^{ijk},$$
(2.19)
and the $`6j`$-symbol can be calculated using the formula (A.3) given in the Appendix. The result is:

$$\text{}=(1)\frac{1}{\sqrt{3!}}\frac{1}{\sqrt{N+1}}\frac{1}{\sqrt{\frac{N}{2}(\frac{N}{2}+1)}}.$$
(2.20)
Combining all this together, we see that (2.16) indeed holds.

We thus learn that the quantization rule (2.7) coincides with the standard quantization map (1.1), at least for the spherical harmonics of the first order. Interestingly, the result of the commutator in the quantum case turns out to be expressed through the $`6j`$-symbol. In the case considered when all the spins were taken to be $`l=1`$, the commutator coincides with the classical result. However, for higher modes $`l`$ one expects a deviation from the classical expressions. This is summarized in the notion of the $``$-product. We shall now illustrate the described spin network techniques by deriving some facts about this $``$-product.

## 3 The $`_N`$-product

As we have said in the introduction, our aim is to illustrate the spin network construction by deriving some facts about the fuzzy sphere non-commutative product. However, before we introduce and study this product, let us review the usual $``$-product that arises in the deformation quantization of $`^3`$ equipped with Poisson structure invariant under the rotation group. We will then discuss a relation between this, and the fuzzy sphere product.

Let us start by reminding some general facts about $``$-products. A $``$-product gives a non-commutative deformation of the usual (point-wise) multiplication of functions. Let $`𝒜=𝒞^{\mathrm{}}(M)`$ be the space of smooth function on a manifold $`M`$, and suppose that $`M`$ is equipped with a Poisson bracket $`\{,\}`$. Let us denote by $`A[[\mathrm{}]]`$ the space of formal power series with coefficients in $`𝒜`$. A star product on $`𝒜`$ is an associative, $`[[\mathrm{}]]`$-linear product on $`A[[\mathrm{}]]`$. The product of two functions on $`M`$ is given by

$$\varphi \psi =\underset{n}{}\mathrm{}^nB_n(f,g),$$
(3.1)
$`B_n(,)`$ being bidifferential operators. The first term in the expansion is the usual commutative product $`B_0(f,g)=fg`$, while the first term in the commutator is the Poisson bracket $`B_1(f,g)B_1(g,f)=\{f,g\}`$. The Poisson bracket therefore gives the germ of deformation of the commutative product towards $``$-product. There is a notion of gauge transformation that can be defined on the set of $``$-products and Poisson brackets. The group of these gauge transformations consists of linear automorphisms of $`𝒜[[\mathrm{}]]`$ of the following form:

$$fU(f)=f+\mathrm{}U_1(f)+\mathrm{}+\mathrm{}^nU_n(f),$$
(3.2)
where $`U_i(f)`$ are differential operators. It acts on the set of star product as

$$\varphi _U\psi =U^1(U(\varphi )U(\psi )).$$
(3.3)
Products related by a such transformation are called equivalent.

As is well known, if $`M`$ is the dual of a Lie algebra, $`M=𝔤^{}`$ there is the so-called Kirillov-Lie Poisson structure on it, whose symplectic leaves are coadjoint orbits. The bracket is

$$\{\varphi ,\psi \}(x)=x^kC_k^{ij}_i\varphi (x)_j\psi (x),$$
(3.4)
where $`x^i`$ are the components of $`x𝔤^{}`$. Using the natural identification between linear functions on $`𝔤^{}`$ and $`𝔤`$ one can equivalently view $`x^i`$ as a basis $`e^i`$ in $`𝔤`$. Then $`C_k^{ij}`$ are the structure constants with respect to this basis. This identification extends to a natural isomorphism between the space $`\mathrm{Pol}(𝔤^{})`$ of polynomials in $`x^i`$ and symmetric algebra $`\mathrm{Sym}(𝔤^{})`$. There are several equivalent ways to introduce a deformation quantization of the Kirillov bracket. We shall refer to the arising $``$-product as Kirillov $``$-product.

Universal enveloping algebra

The standard way to introduce a $``$-product in $`𝔤^{}`$ is by using the universal enveloping algebra $`𝔘(𝔤)`$. Recall that the universal enveloping algebra $`𝔘(𝔤)`$ of the Lie algebra $`𝔤`$ with generators $`e^i`$ satisfying

$$[e^i,e^j]=\mathrm{}C_k^{ij}e^k,$$
(3.5)
where $`C_k^{ij}`$ are the structure constants, is the algebra generated by all polynomials in the generators $`e^i`$ modulo the relation $`XYYX=[X,Y]`$ for all $`X,Y𝔤`$. The Poincare-Birkhoff-Witt theorem states that $`𝔘`$ is isomorphic to the algebra $`\mathrm{Sym}(𝔤)\mathrm{Pol}(𝔤^{})`$ generated by all completely symmetrized polynomials in the generators: $`𝔘(𝔤)\mathrm{Sym}(𝔤)`$. Since the algebra $`\mathrm{Sym}(𝔤)`$ is naturally isomorphic to the algebra $`\mathrm{Pol}(𝔤^{})`$ of polynomial functions on the dual space $`𝔤^{}`$, we have the one-to-one map

$`\sigma :\mathrm{Pol}(𝔤^{})𝔘(𝔤),`$
$`x^{k_1}\mathrm{}x^{k_n}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{n!}}{\displaystyle \underset{s}{}}e^{k_{s(1)}}\mathrm{}e^{k_{s(n)}},`$
where the sum is taken over all permutations $`s`$ of $`n`$ integers, $`x^i`$ are linear functionals on $`𝔤^{}`$, and $`e^i`$ are the corresponding elements in $`𝔤`$. Using the map $`\sigma `$, one can define the following non-commutative product on $`\mathrm{Pol}(𝔤^{})`$:

$$(\varphi \psi )(x)=\sigma ^1\left[\sigma (\varphi )\sigma (\psi )\right].$$
(3.6)
Note that this $``$-product explicitly depends on the deformation parameter $`\mathrm{}`$ because the later enters the commutator (3.5). It is not so straightforward to see that this product can be expanded in terms of differential operators. For example, one can prove the following formula:

$$(e^XY)(x)=e^{X(x)}\left[\frac{\mathrm{ad}X}{1e^{\mathrm{ad}X}}Y\right](x).$$
(3.7)
Baker-Campbell-Haussdorf formula

The Baker-Campbell-Haussdorf formula states that, given two Lie algebra elements $`X,Y`$, the product of the corresponding group elements can be expressed as:

$$e^Xe^Y=e^{X+Y+\mathrm{\Psi }(X,Y)},$$
(3.8)
where $`X,Y,\mathrm{\Psi }(X,Y)𝔤`$ and

X+Y+Ψ(X,Y)=m=1(1)(m1)m

+kili1
ki0,li0
[Xk1Yl1XkmYlm]k1!l1!km!lm!,𝑋𝑌Ψ𝑋𝑌superscriptsubscript𝑚1superscript1𝑚1𝑚subscript

+kili1
ki0,li0
delimited-[]superscript𝑋subscript𝑘1superscript𝑌subscript𝑙1superscript𝑋subscript𝑘𝑚superscript𝑌subscript𝑙𝑚subscript𝑘1subscript𝑙1subscript𝑘𝑚subscript𝑙𝑚X+Y+\Psi(X,Y)=\sum_{m=1}^{\infty}{(-1)^{(m-1)}\over m}\sum_{\vbox{\hbox{$k_{i}+l_{i}\geq 1$}\hbox{$k_{i}\geq 0,l_{i}\geq 0$}}}{[X^{k_{1}}Y^{l_{1}}\cdots X^{k_{m}}Y^{l_{m}}]\over k_{1}!l_{1}!\cdots k_{m}!l_{m}!}, (3.9)
and $`[X_1\mathrm{}X_n]`$, $`X_i𝔤`$ denotes $`\frac{1}{n}[\mathrm{}[[X_1,X_2],X_3],\mathrm{},X_n]`$. This is the so-called Campbell-Hausdorff formula in the Dynkin form, see, e.g., . Representing the commutator as $`[X,Y]=XYYX`$, one can think of $`\mathrm{\Psi }(X,Y)`$ as a complicated sum of polynomials in the components $`X_i,Y_i`$:

$$\mathrm{\Psi }_i(X,Y)=\underset{i_\stackrel{}{n}j_\stackrel{}{m}}{}A_i^{i_\stackrel{}{n}j_\stackrel{}{m}}X_{i_1}\mathrm{}X_{i_n}Y_{j_1}\mathrm{}Y_{j_m}.$$
(3.10)
One then defines a $``$-product on the space of functions on $`^3=𝔤^{}`$ by:

$$(\varphi \psi )(x)=\varphi e^{\frac{1}{\mathrm{}}(x|\mathrm{\Psi }(\mathrm{},\mathrm{}))}\psi ,$$
(3.11)
where we have replaced the argument $`X_i`$ of $`\mathrm{\Psi }(X,Y)`$ by $`\mathrm{}`$ times the derivative $`/x^i`$ acting on the left on $`\varphi `$, and the argument $`Y_i`$ by the derivative acting on the right on $`\psi `$. The quantity $`(x|\mathrm{\Psi })`$ in the exponential stands for the contraction $`x^i\mathrm{\Psi }_i`$. One can prove that the product (3.11) is, in fact, the same as (3.6). A good exposition of the relation between these two quantizations, and also of the relation of both to the Kontsevich deformation quantization, is given in .

Path integral

The third way to define Kirillov $``$-product uses a version of Cattaneo-Felder  path integral. For the case in question, the function $`\alpha ^{ij}(x)`$ that determines the Poisson structure:

$$\{\varphi ,\psi \}=\underset{ij}{}\alpha ^{ij}(x)_i\varphi (x)_j\psi (x)$$
(3.12)
is linear in $`x`$, and the action used in  can be given a simple form of the action of the so-called BF theory. Thus, let us consider the following theory on the unit disc. It has two dynamical fields: the field $`B_i`$, which is $`𝔤^{}`$ valued, this field is the analog of the field $`X^i`$ of , and the $`G`$-connection $`A^i`$, with curvature $`F^i(A)`$. This connection is the analog of the one-form field $`\eta `$ of . The action is then given by:

$$S[B,A]=_UB_iF^i(A),$$
(3.13)
where the integral is taken over the unit disc $`U`$. The $``$-product is then given by the following path integral:

$$(\varphi \psi )(x)=\varphi (B(0))\psi (B(1))_x_{B(\mathrm{})=x}𝒟B𝒟A\varphi (B(0))\psi (B(1))e^{\frac{1}{\mathrm{}}{\scriptscriptstyle BF}}.$$
(3.14)
Thus, the $``$-product is obtained by computing the correlation function of two operators in this theory. The operators are given by functions $`\varphi ,\psi `$ on the values of the $`B`$-field at two boundary points $`0,1U`$. The value of $`B`$ at the third boundary point $`\mathrm{}`$ is kept fixed in the path integral. One also has the boundary conditions for the connection: it is required that the connection one-form vanishes on $`U`$ on vectors tangent to the boundary. Then the perturbative expansion of the path integral (3.14) gives a non-commutative product in $`^3`$, which can be checked to be associative, and, thus, is a $``$-product. Since the BF action (3.13) is essentially the one used by Cattaneo and Felder , the product (3.14) is the Kontsevich product . It can then be shown, see , that this product is equivalent to the one defined using the Campbell-Hausdorff formula.

$`_N`$-Product

Having reviewed the usual $``$-product, let us introduce the non-commutative product that is relevant in the context of the fuzzy sphere. The square integrable functions on $`S^2`$ can be decomposed into the basis of spherical harmonics:

$$\varphi (x)=\underset{lm}{}\varphi _m^l\mathrm{\Theta }_m^l(x).$$
(3.15)
We have a quantization map, which sends spherical harmonics $`\mathrm{\Theta }_m^l,lN`$ to matrices (2.11). Under this map, functions are sent to matrices:

$$\varphi (x)\widehat{\varphi }=\underset{l=0}{\overset{N}{}}\underset{m}{}\varphi _m^l\widehat{\mathrm{\Theta }}_m^l$$
(3.16)
Note that this map is insensitive to the “high frequency” behavior of the function, for it cuts off all the harmonics with $`l>N`$.

Let us also construct the inverse map. To this end, we introduce the non-commutative analog of $`\delta `$-function:

$$\widehat{\delta }_x=\underset{l=0}{\overset{N}{}}\underset{m}{}\mathrm{dim}_l(\widehat{\mathrm{\Theta }}_m^l)^{}\mathrm{\Theta }_m^l(x).$$
(3.17)
Thus, the “quantum” $`\delta `$-function is a matrix that in addition depends on a point $`xS^2`$. Note that the $`\delta `$-function is “real”: $`\widehat{\delta }^{}=\widehat{\delta }`$. Given an arbitrary operator (matrix) $`\widehat{\varphi }`$ one can construct from it a square integrable function:

$$\widehat{\varphi }\varphi (x)=\frac{1}{N+1}\mathrm{Tr}\left(\widehat{\delta }_x\widehat{\varphi }\right).$$
(3.18)
The resulting functions, of course, contain only the modes with $`lN`$. Using the $`\delta `$-function (3.17) one can also give another expression for the quantization rule (3.16). Indeed, we have:

$$\widehat{\varphi }=_{S^2}𝑑x\widehat{\delta }_x\varphi (x).$$
(3.19)
One can easily check that the composition of the quantization map (3.16) and its inverse (3.18) give back the function one started from with all its modes $`l>N`$ cut off. Let us formalize this introducing the notion of the projector $`𝒫_N`$:

$$\varphi \widehat{\varphi }\frac{1}{N+1}\mathrm{Tr}\left(\widehat{\delta }_x\widehat{\varphi }\right)=𝒫_N\varphi .$$
(3.20)
Thus, the maps (3.16) and (3.18) are one-to-one on the space of functions that only contain modes up to $`N`$. Let us denote this space by $`𝒜^N`$. Note that $`𝒜^N=𝒜^{\mathrm{}}/\mathrm{Ker}𝒫_N`$, where $`𝒜^{\mathrm{}}`$ is the algebra of all $`L^2`$ functions on $`S^2`$.

Having defined the quantization map, we can use it to define a non-commutative product on the space $`𝒜^N`$ via:

$$\widehat{\varphi _N\psi }=\widehat{\varphi }\widehat{\psi }.$$
(3.21)
Let us emphasize that this is well defined only in $`𝒜^N`$ since $`\widehat{\varphi }=\widehat{𝒫_N\varphi }`$ and the product $`_N`$ does not coincide with the usual $``$-product reviewed above, because they are defined on different spaces. While $`_N`$ is the product on the space of functions $`𝒜^N`$, the “real” $``$-product acts on the space of all square integrable functions $`𝒜^{\mathrm{}}`$. However, we are going to show that the $`_N`$-product is related to the usual $``$-product via:

$$\varphi _N\psi =𝒫_N\left[\varphi _{\mathrm{}}\psi \right]|_{\mathrm{}=2/(N+1)}.$$
(3.22)
Let us note that the interplay between the non-commutative product and deformation quantization was studied before, see, e.g., . What is new in this paper is the justification for the formula (3.22) coming from an explicit expression for the asymptotic expansion of the $`_N`$-product in powers of the non-commutativity parameter. To find this expansion we consider the $`_N`$-product of the modes. The product of two matrices $`\widehat{\mathrm{\Theta }}`$ can be decomposed into a sum of $`\widehat{\mathrm{\Theta }}`$. A simple calculation, similar to the one performed in (2.17), (2.18), gives:

$$\mathrm{\Theta }_{m_1}^{l_1}_N\mathrm{\Theta }_{m_2}^{l_2}=\underset{l_3=0}{\overset{N}{}}\underset{m_3}{}\mathrm{dim}_{l_3}\mathrm{\Theta }_{m_3}^{l_3}\text{}\sqrt{N+1}\text{}$$
(3.23)
Let us notice that the right hand side depends on $`N`$ only through the $`6j`$-symbol (and the square root), and the cutoff in the sum. Therefore, the non-trivial information about the $`1/N`$ expansion of the $`_N`$-product is all contained in the $`6j`$-symbol. Thus, the fuzzy sphere gives us an interesting example of a non-commutative manifold for which the $``$-product is not only known in terms of its $`1/N`$ derivative expansion, but also in closed form, in terms of the $`6j`$-symbol in (3.23).

Let us note that (3.23) can also be written as:

$$\mathrm{\Theta }_{m_1}^{l_1}_N\mathrm{\Theta }_{m_2}^{l_2}=\underset{l_3=0}{\overset{N}{}}𝒫^{(l_3)}\left(\mathrm{\Theta }_{m_1}^{l_1}\mathrm{\Theta }_{m_2}^{l_2}\right)\mathrm{\Psi }_{(N)}(l_1,l_2,l_3),$$
(3.24)
where $`𝒫^{(l)}`$ is the projector on $`l`$-th representation

$$𝒫_N=\underset{lN}{}𝒫^{(l)},$$
(3.25)
and

$$\mathrm{\Psi }_{(N)}(l_1,l_2,l_3):=\frac{\sqrt{N+1}}{\widehat{C}_{\mathrm{0\hspace{0.17em}0\hspace{0.17em}0}}^{l_3l_1l_2}}\text{}$$
(3.26)
As we show below,

$$\underset{N\mathrm{}}{lim}\sqrt{N+1}\text{}=\widehat{C}_{\mathrm{0\hspace{0.17em}0\hspace{0.17em}0}}^{l_3l_1l_2}.$$
(3.27)
This implies that the expansion of the function $`\mathrm{\Psi }_{(N)}(l_1,l_2,l_3)`$ in powers of $`1/N`$ starts from one. This fact, together with the relation (2.5) means that the zeroth order term in the $`1/N`$ expansion of the $`_N`$-product of two modes $`\mathrm{\Theta }`$ is given by the usual product, which is what one expects.

Before we look more closely into the details of the asymptotic expansion, let us show that the non-commutative product defined by (3.23) is indeed an associative product. Interestingly, the associativity follows from the so-called Biedenharn-Elliott (or pentagon) identity, which reads:

$$\underset{l}{}\mathrm{dim}_l\text{}$$
(3.28)
Note that although one has to sum over all $`l`$ in this formula, only the terms with $`lN`$ survive. We are also going to use the following recoupling identity:

$$\text{}=\underset{l_6}{}\mathrm{dim}_{l_6}\text{}$$
(3.29)
Here the sum is taken over all $`l_6`$. The proof of the associativity is then as follows:

$`\left(\mathrm{\Theta }^{l_1}_N\mathrm{\Theta }^{l_2}\right)_N\mathrm{\Theta }^{l_3}={\displaystyle \underset{l_3^{}}{}}\mathrm{dim}_{l_3^{}}\mathrm{\Theta }^{l_3^{}}_N\mathrm{\Theta }^{l_3}\text{}=`$
$`{\displaystyle \underset{l_3^{}l_4}{}}\mathrm{dim}_{l_3^{}}\mathrm{dim}_{l_4}\mathrm{\Theta }^{l_4}\text{}=`$
$`{\displaystyle \underset{l_3^{}l_3^{\prime \prime }l_4}{}}\mathrm{dim}_{l_3^{}}\mathrm{dim}_{l_3^{\prime \prime }}\mathrm{dim}_{l_4}\mathrm{\Theta }^{l_4}\text{}=`$ (3.30)
$`{\displaystyle \underset{l_3^{\prime \prime }l_4}{}}\mathrm{dim}_{l_3^{\prime \prime }}\mathrm{dim}_{l_4}\mathrm{\Theta }^{l_4}\text{}=\mathrm{\Theta }^{l_1}_N\left(\mathrm{\Theta }^{l_2}_N\mathrm{\Theta }^{l_3}\right).`$
Here we used the recoupling identity (3.29) to get the third line, and the pentagon identity (3.28) to get the last line. Note that, although in the third line the sum is taken over all $`l_3^{\prime \prime }`$, in the last line, after we used the pentagon identity, only the terms with $`l_3^{\prime \prime }N`$ are non-zero. Thus, the associativity of the product $`_N`$ is intimately related to the associativity in the category of irreducible representations of $`\mathrm{SU}(2)`$, of which the Biedenharn-Elliot identity is a manifestation.

Let us now study the asymptotic expansion of the $`_N`$-product more closely. To this end, let us rewrite the formula (A.3) for the $`6j`$-symbol in a form that is convenient for taking the large $`N`$-limit. It is convenient to introduce, for $`N+a0`$:<sup>*</sup><sup>*</sup>*It is not hard to recognize this function as related to the one appearing in the infinite limit Euler definition of $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ function. Indeed, $`\gamma (z;n)=\mathrm{\Gamma }(z1)/F(z1,n+1)`$, where $`F(z,n)=n^zn!/(z(z+1)\mathrm{}(z+n))=n^z_0^1(1u)^nu^{z1}𝑑u`$, and $`lim_n\mathrm{}F(z,n)=\mathrm{\Gamma }(z)`$.

$$\gamma (a;N)=\frac{(N+a)!}{N!(N+1)^a}.$$
(3.31)
Since, for $`a>0`$,

$$\gamma (a;N)=\underset{k=1}{\overset{a}{}}(1+\frac{k1}{N+1}),$$
(3.32)
this function, is analytic in $`1/(N+1)`$, and, for positive $`a`$, is a polynomial of degree $`a1`$. We have:

$$\gamma (a;N)=1+\frac{1}{N+1}\frac{a(a1)}{2}+\mathrm{}+\left(\frac{1}{N+1}\right)^{a1}(a1)!$$
(3.33)
One can similarly rewrite the function $`\gamma (a;N),a>0`$ as one over a polynomial of degree $`a`$:

$$\gamma (a;N)=\frac{1}{_{k=1}^a\left(1\frac{k}{N+1}\right)}.$$
(3.34)
Using this function, the $`6j`$-symbol can be rewritten as:

$`\text{}=(1)^{l_1}(N+1)^{1/2}l_3!\left[{\displaystyle \frac{(l_1+l_2l_3)!}{(l_1l_2+l_3)!(l_2l_1+l_3)!(l_1+l_2+l_3+1)!}}\right]^{1/2}`$
$`\left[{\displaystyle \frac{\gamma (l_1;N)\gamma (l_1+1;N)\gamma (l_3+1;N)}{\gamma (l_2;N)\gamma (l_3;N)\gamma (l_2+1;N)}}\right]^{1/2}`$ (3.35)
$`{\displaystyle \underset{k}{}}{\displaystyle \frac{(1)^k}{k!}}{\displaystyle \frac{(l_1+k)!(l_2+l_3k)!}{(l_1k)!(l_2l_3+k)!(l_3k)!}}{\displaystyle \frac{\gamma (l_3+k;N)}{\gamma (k+1;N)}}.`$
The sum here is restricted to those $`k`$ for which the quantities inside the factorials are non-negative. Using the representations (3.32), (3.34) for the $`\gamma `$ function, it is not hard to deduce the analyticity properties of the $`6j`$-symbol as a function of $`1/(N+1)`$. We will need these properties below, when we discuss the relation between $`_N`$ and the usual $``$-product. Function $`\gamma (a+1;N),a>0`$, viewed as a function of $`1/(N+1)`$ has simple zeros on the negative axes, with the closest to origin zero located at $`1/(N+1)=1/a`$. Function $`\gamma (a;N),a`$ has simple poles on the positive axes, with the closest to the origin pole located at $`1/(N+1)=1/a`$. Then, the expression under the square root in (3.35) can be shown to have at most simple poles and zeros on the positive axes and at most second order zeros on the negative axes. The function inside the sum in (3.35) has simple poles both on the positive and negative axes. This proves that the $`6j`$-symbol times $`\sqrt{N+1}`$ (3.35) is an analytic function of $`1/(N+1)`$ in the open disc of radius $`\mathrm{min}(1/l_1,1/l_2,1/l_3)`$ around zero. Moreover, all singularities are located on the positive and negative axes. This means that the function $`\mathrm{\Psi }_{(N)}(l_1,l_2,l_3)`$ introduced in (3.26) can be analytically continued, as a function of $`1/(N+1)`$, to the whole complex plane. Introducing $`\mathrm{}=2/(N+1)`$ we shall denote the analytic continuation of $`\mathrm{\Psi }_{(N)}(l_1,l_2,l_3)`$ by $`\mathrm{\Psi }(l_1,l_2,l_3;\mathrm{})`$.

It is not hard to find first terms of the expansion of $`6j`$ in powers of $`1/(N+1)`$. We get:

$`\sqrt{N+1}\text{}=\widehat{C}_{\mathrm{0\hspace{0.17em}0\hspace{0.17em}0}}^{l_1l_2l_3}\left(1+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{(N+1)}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\left(C_{l_1}C_{l_2}+C_{l_3}\right)\right)`$
$`{\displaystyle \frac{(1)^{l_1}}{(N+1)}}(l_3+1)!\left[{\displaystyle \frac{(l_1+l_2l_3)!}{(l_1l_2+l_3)!(l_2l_1+l_3)!(l_1+l_2+l_3+1)!}}\right]^{1/2}`$ (3.36)
$`{\displaystyle \underset{k}{}}{\displaystyle \frac{(1)^k}{k!}}k{\displaystyle \frac{(l_1+k)!(l_2+l_3k)!}{(l_1k)!(l_2l_3+k)!(l_3k)!}}+O(1/N^2),`$
where we have introduced a notation $`C_l=l(l+1)`$ and we have used the expression (A.4) for $`C_{\mathrm{0\hspace{0.17em}0\hspace{0.17em}0}}^{l_3l_1l_2}`$. This proves that the zeroth order term is given by the usual commutative product.

Let us introduce a notation for the prefactor in front of the sum:

$`\rho (l_3,l_1,l_2)=(1)^{l_1}l_3!\left[{\displaystyle \frac{(l_1+l_2l_3)!}{(l_1l_2+l_3)!(l_2l_1+l_3)!(l_1+l_2+l_3+1)!}}\right]^{1/2}.`$ (3.37)
Then it can be noted that the sum in (3.36) is related to a certain Clebsch-Gordan coefficient. Namely,

$`\widehat{C}_{\mathrm{1\hspace{0.33em}1\hspace{0.33em}0}}^{l_3l_1l_2}={\displaystyle \frac{1}{l_3}}\left({\displaystyle \frac{C_3}{C_1}}\right)^{1/2}\rho (l_3,l_1,l_2){\displaystyle \underset{k}{}}{\displaystyle \frac{(1)^k}{k!}}{\displaystyle \frac{(l_1+k)!(l_2+l_3k)!}{(l_1k)!(l_2l_3+k)!}}{\displaystyle \frac{k}{(l_3k)!}}.`$ (3.38)
Therefore, the first order term in the expansion, that is, the coefficient of $`1/(N+1)`$ term in (3.36) can be written as:

$$\frac{1}{2}(C_1C_2+C_3)\widehat{C}_{\mathrm{0\hspace{0.33em}0\hspace{0.33em}0}}^{l_3l_1l_2}(C_1C_3)^{1/2}\widehat{C}_{\mathrm{1\hspace{0.33em}1\hspace{0.33em}0}}^{l_3l_1l_2}.$$
(3.39)
It is now possible to prove the following two identities on Clebsch-Gordan coefficients,

$`(C_1C_2+C_3)\widehat{C}_{\mathrm{0\hspace{0.33em}0\hspace{0.33em}0}}^{l_3l_1l_2}`$ $`=`$ $`(C_1C_3)^{1/2}(\widehat{C}_{\mathrm{1\hspace{0.33em}1\hspace{0.33em}0}}^{l_3l_1l_2}+\widehat{C}_{1\mathrm{1\hspace{0.33em}0}}^{l_3l_1l_2}),`$ (3.40)
$`\widehat{C}_{\mathrm{1\hspace{0.33em}1\hspace{0.33em}0}}^{l_3l_1l_2}`$ $`=`$ $`(1)^{l_1+l_2+l_3}\widehat{C}_{1\mathrm{1\hspace{0.33em}0}}^{l_3l_1l_2}.`$
The first equality is just the expression of the intertwining property of the Clebsch-Gordan coefficient, and the second is a symmetry relation.

These two identities imply that (3.39) is equal to zero if $`l_1+l_2+l_3`$ is even. It is also clear that for odd $`l_1+l_2+l_3`$ it equals to

$$(C_1C_3)^{1/2}\widehat{C}_{\mathrm{1\hspace{0.33em}1\hspace{0.33em}0}}^{l_3l_1l_2}.$$
(3.41)
However, as is shown in the Appendix, this quantity is just $`P(l_1,l_2,l_3)`$, which is the coefficient that appears in the decomposition of the Poisson bracket of two spherical harmonics. This proves that the first order term is given by the Poisson bracket.

We can summarize all of the above results in a form of the following theorem.

###### Theorem 1

There exists a function $`\mathrm{\Psi }(l_1,l_2,l_3;\mathrm{})`$, given by the analytic continuation of the function $`\mathrm{\Psi }_{(N)}(l_1,l_2,l_3)`$ introduced in (3.26), which is analytic in $`\mathrm{}`$ in the open disc of radius $`\mathrm{min}(1/l_1,1/l_2,1/l_3)`$ around zero, and

$$\mathrm{\Psi }(l_1,l_2,l_3;\mathrm{})=1+\mathrm{}\mathrm{\Psi }_1(l_1,l_2,l_3)+\left(\mathrm{}\right)^2\mathrm{\Psi }_2(l_1,l_2,l_3)+\mathrm{}$$
(3.42)
For $`Nl_1,l_2,l_3`$,

$$\mathrm{\Psi }(l_1,l_2,l_3;\mathrm{})|_{\mathrm{}=2/(N+1)}=\mathrm{\Psi }_{(N)}(l_1,l_2,l_3).$$
(3.43)
The product defined via:

$$\mathrm{\Theta }_{m_1}^{l_1}_{\mathrm{}}\mathrm{\Theta }_{m_2}^{l_2}=\underset{l_3=0}{\overset{N}{}}𝒫^{(l_3)}\left(\mathrm{\Theta }_{m_1}^{l_1}\mathrm{\Theta }_{m_2}^{l_2}\right)\mathrm{\Psi }(l_1,l_2,l_3;\mathrm{})$$
(3.44)
is an associative product. Moreover,

$`\varphi _{\mathrm{}}\psi \psi _{\mathrm{}}\varphi =\mathrm{}\{\varphi ,\psi \}+o(\mathrm{}),`$
$`𝒫_N[\varphi ]_N𝒫_N[\psi ]=𝒫_N\left[\varphi _{\mathrm{}}\psi \right]|_{\mathrm{}=2/(N+1)}.`$ (3.45)
The associativity follows from the analytic continuation of Biedenharn-Elliot identity, see (3.28). What we did not prove is that the non-commutative product (3.44) is indeed a $``$-product, that is given by the expansion in terms of derivatives. This is, in principle, possible with our techniques by considering the higher terms in the expansion of the $`6j`$-symbol. Thus, modulo this caveat, the $`_{\mathrm{}}`$-product gives a deformation quantization of Kirillov bracket, and must thus be equivalent to the usual Kirillov $``$-product. The formula (3.45) then establishes a relation between the fuzzy sphere product and Kirillov product.

We conclude by observing that the expressions (3.23), (3.24) for the $`_N`$-product can be used to define a non-commutative product on the so-called $`q`$-deformed fuzzy sphere. While the usual fuzzy sphere is defined as the structure covariant under the action of the group $`\mathrm{SU}(2)`$, its $`q`$-deformed analog is covariant under the action of the quantum group $`U_q(su(2))`$. For a definition of the $`q`$-deformed fuzzy sphere see, e.g., . The expression (3.23) can then be used to get the product on the $`q`$-deformed sphere. To this end, one should replace all objects appearing on the right hand side of (3.23) –the dimension, the $`3j`$ and $`6j`$-symbols– by the corresponding $`q`$-deformed quantities. One gets a $`q`$-deformed product. This product is still associative, for the proof (3.30) of associativity based on the pentagon identity holds for the quantum group as well. This $`q`$-deformed product was discussed in , where the usual fuzzy sphere version (3.23) is also mentioned. It would be quite interesting to obtain an analog of our asymptotic formula for the $`q`$-deformed product.

Acknowledgments

K. K. was supported by the NSF grant PHY95-07065, L. F. was supported by CNRS and an ACI-Blanche grant.

## Appendix A Some formulas

In the main text we use the values of the integrals of the product of two and three matrix elements. These are given by:

$$_G𝑑g\overline{l_1,m_1|T_g|l_1,m_1^{}}l_2,m_2|T_g|l_2,m_2^{}=\frac{\delta ^{l_1l_2}\delta _{m_1m_2}\delta _{m_1^{}m_2^{}}}{\mathrm{dim}_{l_1}},$$
(A.1)
and

$$_G𝑑g\overline{l_3,m_3|T_g|l_3,m_3^{}}l_1,m_1|T_g|l_1,m_1^{}l_2,m_2|T_g|l_2,m_2^{}=\widehat{C}_{m_3^{}m_1^{}m_2^{}}^{l_3l_1l_2}\overline{\widehat{C}_{m_3m_1m_2}^{l_3l_1l_2}}.$$
(A.2)
Let us now give some explicit formulas for the $`3j`$ and $`6j`$-symbols. All these formulas are from , with normalizations properly adjusted to match our conventions. We have:

$`\text{}=(1)^{l_1}l_3!\left[{\displaystyle \frac{(l_1+l_2l_3)!}{(l_1l_2+l_3)!(l_2l_1+l_3)!(l_1+l_2+l_3+1)!}}\right]^{1/2}`$
$`\left[{\displaystyle \frac{(Nl_1)!(N+l_1+1)!(N+l_3+1)!}{(N+l_2+1)!(Nl_2)!(Nl_3)!}}\right]^{1/2}`$ (A.3)
$`{\displaystyle \underset{k}{}}{\displaystyle \frac{(1)^k}{k!}}{\displaystyle \frac{(l_1+k)!(l_2+l_3k)!}{(l_1k)!(l_2l_3+k)!(l_3k)!}}{\displaystyle \frac{(Nl_3+k)!}{(N+k+1)!}}.`$
Here the sum is taken over all $`k`$ such that the factorials are taken of non-negative integers. Using this formula it is not hard to get the value (2.20) of the $`6j`$-symbol for all spins being equal to 1. In this case the sum in (A.3) is taken only over two values $`k=0,1`$ and the calculation leading to (2.20) is straightforward.

Let us also give an expression for the $`3j`$-symbol $`C_{\mathrm{0\hspace{0.17em}0\hspace{0.17em}0}}^{l_3l_1l_2}`$. It can be obtained from the general expression for the $`3j`$-symbol (in terms of a finite sum) given in . Taking into account the difference in normalizations, we get:

$$\widehat{C}_{\mathrm{0\hspace{0.17em}0\hspace{0.17em}0}}^{l_3l_1l_2}=\rho (l_3,l_1,l_2)\underset{k}{}\frac{(1)^k}{k!}\frac{(l_1+k)!(l_2+l_3k)!}{(l_1k)!(l_2l_3+k)!(l_3k)!},$$
(A.4)
where

$`\rho (l_3,l_1,l_2)=(1)^{l_1}l_3!\left[{\displaystyle \frac{(l_1+l_2l_3)!}{(l_1l_2+l_3)!(l_2l_1+l_3)!(l_1+l_2+l_3+1)!}}\right]^{1/2}.`$ (A.5)
We should also note the formula:

$$\widehat{C}_{\mathrm{0\hspace{0.17em}0\hspace{0.17em}0}}^{ll_1l_2}=\frac{(1)^{gl}g!\mathrm{\Delta }(l_1,l_2,l)}{(gl_1)!(gl_2)!(gl)!},$$
(A.6)
where $`l_1+l_2+l=2g,g`$, and $`\mathrm{\Delta }(l_1,l_2,l)`$ is given by

$$\mathrm{\Delta }(l_1,l_2,l)=\left[\frac{(l_1+l_2l)!(l_1l_2+l)!(l_2l_1+l)!}{(l_1+l_2+l+1)!}\right]^{1/2}.$$
(A.7)
## Appendix B Poisson bracket of spherical harmonics

In this section we calculate the Poisson bracket of spherical harmonics. The result we obtain here is compared in section 3 with the first order term in the expansion of the $`6j`$-symbol in powers of $`1/N`$. We were not able to find a result for this Poisson bracket in the literature, so we sketch the calculation here.

We begin with some notations. Let $`J_i`$ be generators of the Lie algebra of $`\mathrm{SU}(2)`$: $`[J_i,J_j]=iϵ_{ijk}J_k`$. These generators can be realized as vector fields in $`^3`$. Denoting by $`x_i`$ the usual Cartesian coordinates in $`^3`$, we get:

$$J_i=\frac{1}{i}ϵ_i^{jk}x_j_k.$$
(B.1)
To calculate the Poisson bracket, it is convenient to introduce a set of complex coordinates in $`^3`$. We define $`z=(x_1+ix_2)/\sqrt{2},x=x_3`$ and $`J_\pm =(J_1\pm iJ_2)/\sqrt{2},J=J_3`$. These new generators can be expressed in terms of the complex vector fields $`_z,_{\overline{z}},_x`$. We have:

$$J_+=x_{\overline{z}}z_x,J_{}=\overline{z}_x+x_z,J=z_z\overline{z}_{\overline{z}}.$$
(B.2)
These vector fields satisfy:

$$[J_+,J_{}]=J,[J,J_\pm ]=\pm J_\pm ,$$
(B.3)
and

$$\overline{J_+}=J_{},\overline{J}=J.$$
(B.4)
The spherical harmonics $`\mathrm{\Theta }_m^l`$ are given by:

$$\mathrm{\Theta }_m^l=\alpha _m^lJ_{}^{lm}v,$$
(B.5)
where $`v`$ is the highest weight vector $`v=z^l`$. To calculate the normalization factor $`\alpha _m^l`$ let us consider the norm $`J_{}^{lm}v^2`$. Using

$$[J_+,J_{}^n]v=\frac{n}{2}(2ln+1)J_{}^{n1}v,$$
(B.6)
we get

$$J_{}^{lm}v^2=(1)^{lm}v|J_+^{lm}J_{}^{lm}|v=(1)^{lm}\frac{1}{2^{lm}}\frac{(lm)!}{(l+m)!}(2l)!v^2.$$
(B.7)
An explicit calculation, using the normalized measure on $`S^3`$, gives:

$$v^2=z^l^2=\mathrm{sin}^{2l}\theta =\frac{1}{(2l+1)}\frac{l!}{(2l1)!!}.$$
(B.8)
Combining these two facts, and taking into account the normalization of $`\mathrm{\Theta }_m^l`$ (2.2), we see that $`\alpha _m^l`$ is, up to a phase, given by:

$$\frac{1}{l!}\left(\frac{(l+m)!}{2^m(lm)!}\right)^{1/2}.$$
(B.9)
We choose the phase factor in such a way that $`\mathrm{\Theta }_m^l`$ coincide with the ones given by (2.1). This gives:

$$\alpha _m^l=\frac{(1)^{lm}}{l!}\left(\frac{(l+m)!}{2^m(lm)!}\right)^{1/2}.$$
(B.10)
It is now straightforward to work out the action of vector fields $`_z,_{\overline{z}},_x`$ on $`\mathrm{\Theta }_m^l`$. We get:

$`_z\mathrm{\Theta }_m^l=\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}(l+m)(l+m1)}\mathrm{\Theta }_{m1}^{l1},`$
$`_{\overline{z}}\mathrm{\Theta }_m^l=\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}(lm)(lm1)}\mathrm{\Theta }_{m+1}^{l1},`$ (B.11)
$`_x\mathrm{\Theta }_m^l=\sqrt{(l+m)(lm)}\mathrm{\Theta }_m^{l1}.`$
We will also need the action of $`\mathrm{SU}(2)`$ generators on $`\mathrm{\Theta }_m^l`$:

$`J_+\mathrm{\Theta }_m^l`$ $`=`$ $`\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}(lm)(l+m+1)}\mathrm{\Theta }_{m+1}^l,`$
$`J_{}\mathrm{\Theta }_m^l`$ $`=`$ $`\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}(l+m)(lm+1)}\mathrm{\Theta }_{m1}^l,`$ (B.12)
$`J\mathrm{\Theta }_m^l`$ $`=`$ $`m\mathrm{\Theta }_m^l.`$
The Poisson bracket is given by:

$$\{f,g\}=\frac{i}{\mathrm{sin}\theta }\left(\frac{f}{\theta }\frac{g}{\phi }\frac{g}{\theta }\frac{f}{\phi }\right).$$
(B.13)
It is normalized so that $`\{x_1,x_2\}=ix_3`$. It can be expressed in terms of vector fields and generators as:

$$\{f,g\}=_zf(J_+g)+_{\overline{z}}f(J_{}g)+_xf(Jg).$$
(B.14)
Using the expressions (B.11), (B.12) it is now straightforward to compute the Poisson bracket of two spherical harmonics. We have:

$`\{\mathrm{\Theta }_{m_1}^{l_1},\mathrm{\Theta }_{m_2}^{l_2}\}={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}(\sqrt{(l_1+m_1)(l_1+m_11)(l_2m_2)(l_2+m_2+1)}\mathrm{\Theta }_{m_11}^{l_11}\mathrm{\Theta }_{m_2+1}^{l_2}`$
$`\sqrt{(l_1m_1)(l_1m_11)(l_2+m_2)(l_2m_2+1)}\mathrm{\Theta }_{m_1+1}^{l_11}\mathrm{\Theta }_{m_21}^{l_2}`$ (B.15)
$`2\sqrt{(l_1+m_1)(l_1m_1)}m_2\mathrm{\Theta }_{m_1}^{l_11}\mathrm{\Theta }_{m_2}^{l_2}).`$
Thus, using (2.4) we have:

$`{\displaystyle \{\mathrm{\Theta }_{m_1}^{l_1},\mathrm{\Theta }_{m_2}^{l_2}\}\overline{\mathrm{\Theta }_m^l}}={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\overline{\widehat{C}_{\mathrm{0\hspace{0.17em}0\hspace{0.17em}\hspace{0.17em}\hspace{0.17em}\hspace{0.17em}\hspace{0.17em}\hspace{0.17em}0}}^{ll_11l_2}}`$
$`(\sqrt{(l_1+m_1)(l_1+m_11)(l_2m_2)(l_2+m_2+1)}\widehat{C}_{mm_11m_2+1}^{ll_11l_2}`$
$`\sqrt{(l_1m_1)(l_1m_11)(l_2+m_2)(l_2m_2+1)}\widehat{C}_{mm_1+1m_21}^{ll_11l_2}`$ (B.16)
$`2\sqrt{(l_1+m_1)(l_1m_1)}m_2\widehat{C}_{mm_1m_2}^{ll_11l_2}).`$
The requirement of gauge invariance implies that the quantity in brackets is proportional to the Clebsch-Gordan coefficient $`\widehat{C}_{mm_1m_2}^{ll_1l_2}`$, with the proportionality coefficient depending only on $`l_1,l_2,l`$. In other words, we must have:

$`{\displaystyle \{\mathrm{\Theta }_{m_1}^{l_1},\mathrm{\Theta }_{m_2}^{l_2}\}\overline{\mathrm{\Theta }_m^l}}=P(l_1,l_2,l)\widehat{C}_{mm_1m_2}^{ll_1l_2}.`$ (B.17)
The coefficient $`P(l_1,l_2,l)`$ is proportional to $`\widehat{C}_{\mathrm{0\hspace{0.17em}0\hspace{0.17em}\hspace{0.17em}\hspace{0.17em}\hspace{0.17em}\hspace{0.17em}\hspace{0.17em}0}}^{ll_11l_2}`$ and thus is non-zero only when $`l_1+l_2+l=2g1,g`$. Since

$$\widehat{C}_{mm_2m_1}^{ll_2l_1}=(1)^{ll_1l_2}\widehat{C}_{mm_1m_2}^{ll_1l_2},$$
(B.18)
for values of $`l_1,l_2,l`$ summing up to an odd integer the Clebsch-Gordan coefficient changes sign under the exchange of $`l_1`$ with $`l_2`$. Because the Poisson bracket must be anti-symmetric, the coefficient $`P(l_1,l_2,l)`$ must be symmetric under the exchange of $`l_1`$ with $`l_2`$. Let us now determine this coefficient. It can be determined, for example, by choosing $`l=m`$ and using:

$$\widehat{C}_{ljlj}^{ll_1l_2}=(1)^{l_1j}\frac{(l_1+l_2l)!}{(l_1+l_2+l+1)!\mathrm{\Delta }(l_1,l_2,l)}\left[\frac{(l_1+j)!(l_2+lj)!}{(l_1j)!(l_2l+j)!}\right]^{1/2},$$
(B.19)
where

$$\mathrm{\Delta }(l_1,l_2,l)=\left[\frac{(l_1+l_2l)!(l_1l_2+l)!(l_2l_1+l)!}{(l_1+l_2+l+1)!}\right]^{1/2}.$$
(B.20)
After some algebraic manipulations this gives:

$`P(l_1,l_2,l)=(1)^{\frac{l_1+l_2l+1}{2}}(2g+2){\displaystyle \frac{g!\mathrm{\Delta }(l_1,l_2,l)}{(gl_1)!(gl_2)!(gl)!}}.`$ (B.21)
Here $`2g+1=l_1+l_2+l`$ and we have used the formula (A.6) for $`\widehat{C}_{\mathrm{0\hspace{0.17em}0\hspace{0.17em}\hspace{0.17em}\hspace{0.17em}\hspace{0.17em}\hspace{0.17em}\hspace{0.17em}0}}^{ll_11l_2}`$. Expression (B.17) together with (B.21) is our final result for the Poisson bracket of two spherical harmonics. Let us also note that $`P(l_1,l_2,l)`$ can be written as a certain Clebsch-Gordan coefficient:

$$P(l_1,l_2,l)=\sqrt{l_1(l_1+1)l(l+1)}\widehat{C}_{\mathrm{1\hspace{0.33em}1\hspace{0.33em}0}}^{ll_1l_2}.$$
(B.22)
This equality is analogous to formula the (A.6).


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# 1 Introduction

## 1 Introduction

In this note we present a next-to-leading evaluation of the coefficient function of the shape function. The leading-order analysis was done in . The coefficient function allows relating the shape function — computed with a non-perturbative technique — to physical distributions in semi-inclusive heavy-flavour decays.

In general, we consider the process

$$H_hX+\left(\mathrm{𝗇𝗈𝗇}\mathrm{𝖰𝖢𝖣}\mathrm{𝗉𝖺𝗋𝗍𝗈𝗇𝗌}\right)$$
(1)
in the hard limit

$$Q\mathrm{\Lambda }$$
(2)
and in the semi-inclusive region111This region is also called threshold region, large-$`x`$ region, radiation-inhibited region and Sudakov region.

$$MQ,$$
(3)
where $`M`$ is the invariant mass of $`X,`$ the hadronic final state; $`H_h`$ is a hadron containing a heavy quark $`h`$ and the non-QCD partons can be a lepton pair, a vector boson, a photon, etc. The quantity $`Q`$ is the hard scale of the time-like process: $`Q2`$, where $``$ is the final hadronic energy and $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ is the QCD scale. Well-known examples of (1) are:

$$BX_s+\gamma $$
(4)
for a large photon energy and

$$BX_u+l+\nu $$
(5)
for a small hadronic mass or a large electron energy222For the rare decay (4), since $`Q=m_B\left(1+m_{X_s}^2/m_B^2\right),`$ one can actually set $`Q=m_B.`$.

For the hadron at rest, i.e. with velocity $`v=(1;0,0,0),`$ and the jet $`X`$ flying along the minus direction ($`z`$ axis), the shape function is defined as :

$$\phi \left(k_+\right)H_h\left(v\right)|h_v^{}\delta \left(k_+iD_+\right)h_v|H_h\left(v\right).$$
(6)
The latter is also called structure function of the heavy flavour and represents the probability that the heavy quark in the hadron has momenta

$$p_h=m_Hv+k$$
(7)
with any transverse and minus component and with given plus component $`k_+.`$ The static field $`h_v\left(x\right)`$ is related to the Dirac field of the heavy quark $`h\left(x\right)`$ by:

$$h\left(x\right)=e^{im_Hvx}h_v\left(x\right)+O\left(\frac{\mathrm{\Lambda }}{m_H}\right).$$
(8)
With the shape function, the decay (1) is related to its respective quark-level process

$$h\widehat{X}+\left(\mathrm{𝗇𝗈𝗇}\mathrm{𝖰𝖢𝖣}\mathrm{𝗉𝖺𝗋𝗍𝗈𝗇𝗌}\right),$$
(9)
where the heavy quark has the momentum (7) with the distribution (6). Note that the state $`\widehat{X}`$, unlike $`X,`$ does not contain the light valence quark(s) in $`H.`$ The invariant mass $`m`$ of $`\widehat{X}`$ is related to the plus virtuality of the heavy quark $`k_+`$ by the relation:

$$k_+=\frac{m^2}{Q}.$$
(10)
The shape function is a non-perturbative distribution — analogous to parton distribution functions — and it describes the slice of the semi-inclusive region in which

$$m^2\mathrm{\Lambda }Q.$$

In terms of the variables used in QCD and in the effective theory (ET), this is:

$$k_+\mathrm{\Lambda },z1\frac{\mathrm{\Lambda }}{Q},N\frac{Q}{\mathrm{\Lambda }},$$
(11)
where

$$z1\frac{m^2}{Q^2},$$
(12)
and $`N`$ is the moment index (see later).

The shape function describes the mass distribution of a jet coming from the decay of a heavy flavour. It therefore generalizes to region (11) the jet function $`J(Q^2,m^2)`$ introduced in ref. , representing the probability that a light parton produced in a hard collision with scale $`Q`$ evolves inclusively into a jet with mass $`m.`$ The main difference is that in our case the distribution depends on the process as a whole, and not only on the fragmentation of the final quark. The shape function depends on the initial hadron state; for example, it is different for a $`B`$ meson and a $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_b`$ hyperon.

The coefficient function $`C`$ is defined by the relation333QCD quantities are denoted by bold-face symbols, the related quantities in the ET by normal symbols.

$$\phi (k_+;Q)=𝑑k_+^{}C(k_+k_+^{};Q,\mu )\phi (k_+^{};\mu ),$$
(13)
where $`\mu `$ is the renormalization point or UV cut-off of the operator entering the definition of the shape function (see eq. (6)). The coefficient function is then obtained by evaluating in next-to-leading order (NLO) the QCD effective form factor $`\phi (k_+;Q)`$ and the shape function $`\phi (k_+;\mu )`$ and taking their ratio (see later). Since $`C`$ is expected to be a short-distance quantity, we compute the QCD distribution and the shape function in perturbation theory (PT) for an on-shell heavy quark $`(k=0).`$ This expectation will be verified a posteriori.

The coefficient function is different, even at the leading level, for the shape function regulated in dimensional regularization (DR) and in lattice regularization; it is short-distance-dominated in both cases . The main difference is that, at one loop, $`C`$ contains a double logarithm of $`k_+`$ in DR, while it contains at most a single logarithm of $`k_+`$ in lattice regularization. In view of the applications, we specialize ourselves in the lattice case.

The paper is organized as follows. In sec. 2 we present a compact derivation of a resummed QCD form factor $`\phi (k_+;Q)`$ to NLO accuracy. In sec. 3 we perform a similar computation for the shape function $`\phi (k_+;\mu ).`$ In sec. 4 we evaluate the coefficient function and we discuss the physical implications. Finally, in sec. 5, we draw our conclusions.

## 2 The QCD distribution

We are interested in a general QCD distribution $`𝐟\left(z\right)`$ in the threshold region. For clarity’s sake, let us consider a specific case: the photon spectrum in the decay (4),

$$𝐟\left(x\right)=\frac{1}{\mathrm{\Gamma }_B}\frac{d\mathrm{\Gamma }}{dx},$$
(14)
where

$$x\frac{2E_\gamma }{m_b}$$
(15)
and $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_B`$ is the Born width:

$$\mathrm{\Gamma }_B=\frac{\alpha }{\pi }\frac{G_F^2m_b^3m_{b,\overline{MS}}^2(m_b)}{32\pi ^3}|V_{tb}V_{ts}^{}|^2|C_7\left(\mu _b\right)|^2.$$
(16)
The $`\overline{MS}`$ mass is related to the pole-mass by:

$$m_{b,\overline{MS}}(m_b)=\left(1\frac{\alpha _SC_F}{\pi }\right)m_b.$$
(17)
The distribution reads, to order $`\alpha _S`$ :

$$𝐟\left(x\right)=\overline{𝐟}\left(x\right)+\alpha _Sk\delta \left(1x\right)+\alpha _Sd\left(x\right).$$
(18)
The function $`\overline{𝐟}\left(x\right)`$ factorizes (perturbative) long-distance effects occurring in (4) and reads:444Overlined quantities denote subtracted quantities, containing only infrared logarithms.

$$\overline{𝐟}\left(x\right)=\delta \left(1x\right)A_1\alpha _S\left(\frac{\mathrm{log}\left[1x\right]}{1x}\right)_++B_1\alpha _S\left(\frac{1}{1x}\right)_+,$$
(19)
where

$$A_1=\frac{C_F}{\pi },B_1=\frac{7}{4}\frac{C_F}{\pi }$$
(20)
and $`C_F=\left(N_c^21\right)/\left(2N_c\right)=4/3.`$ The spike term involves the constant

$$k=\frac{C_F}{\pi }\left(\mathrm{log}\frac{\mu _b}{m_b}+\frac{5}{4}+\frac{\pi ^2}{3}\right),$$
(21)
where $`\mu _b`$ is the renormalization scale of the operator $`𝒪_7;`$ this (unphysical) scale must be taken of $`O\left(m_b\right)`$ in order to avoid large (ultraviolet) logarithms in the matrix elements. The function $`d\left(x\right)`$ is the “remainder”:

$$d\left(x\right)=\frac{C_F}{4\pi }\left[7+x2x^22\left(1+x\right)\mathrm{log}\left(1x\right)\right].$$
(22)
Plus-distributions are defined as usual as $`P\left(x\right)_+P\left(x\right)\delta \left(1x\right)_0^1𝑑yP\left(y\right).`$ For the resummation, it is natural to write the function $`\overline{𝐟}\left(x\right)`$ in an “unintegrated” form as

$$\overline{𝐟}\left(x\right)=\delta \left(1x\right)+_0^1𝑑ϵ_0^1𝑑t\left[\frac{A_1\alpha _S}{ϵt}+\frac{S_1\alpha _S}{ϵ}+\frac{C_1\alpha _S}{t}\right]\left[\delta \left(1xϵt\right)\delta \left(1x\right)\right],$$
(23)
where we have defined the unitary energy and angular variables

$$ϵ\frac{E}{Q}\mathrm{and}t\frac{1\mathrm{cos}\theta }{2}.$$
(24)
The quantity $`E`$ is two times the energy of the soft gluon, $`E=2E_g,`$ and $`\theta `$ is the gluon emission angle. It proves to be convenient to separate the soft from the collinear term, as we have done. By explicit evaluation, we find

$$S_1=\frac{C_F}{\pi },C_1=\frac{3}{4}\frac{C_F}{\pi }.$$
(25)
Note that $`B_1=S_1+C_1,`$ i.e. it is the sum of the coefficients of the soft and the collinear terms. Expression (23) is symmetric for $`\epsilon t.`$

Next-to-leading corrections are included following these prescriptions:

1. Replacement of the bare coupling by the two-loop running coupling:

$$\alpha _s\left(q^2\right)=\frac{1}{\beta _0\mathrm{log}q^2/\mathrm{\Lambda }^2}\frac{\beta _1}{\beta _0^3}\frac{\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}q^2/\mathrm{\Lambda }^2}{\mathrm{log}^2q^2/\mathrm{\Lambda }^2},$$
(26)
evalutated at the gluon transverse momentum squared :

$$\alpha _S\alpha _S\left(k_{}^2\right),$$
(27)
where

$$k_{}^2Q^2ϵ^2t.$$
(28)
The first two coefficients of the $`\beta `$-function are:

$`\beta _0`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{11C_A2n_F}{12\pi }}={\displaystyle \frac{332n_F}{12\pi }},`$
$`\beta _1`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{17C_A^25C_An_F3C_Fn_F}{24\pi ^2}}={\displaystyle \frac{15319n_F}{24\pi ^2}},`$ (29)
where $`C_A=N_c=3`$ and $`n_F=3`$ is the number of active quark flavours;
2. Inclusion of the two-loop correction to the term $`A_1\alpha _S,`$ so that

$$A_1\alpha _SA_1\alpha _S+A_2\alpha _S^2.$$
(30)
The explicit computation gives

$$A_2=\frac{1}{2}\frac{C_F}{\pi ^2}K$$
(31)
where, in the $`\overline{MS}`$ scheme for the coupling constant,

$$K=C_A\left(\frac{67}{18}\frac{\pi ^2}{6}\right)\frac{10}{9}n_fT_R,$$
(32)
with $`T_R=1/2.`$

The “effective” one-gluon distribution555We call it “effective” because the insertion of the running coupling in the time-like region and of the term proportional to $`A_2`$ already includes some multiple-gluon-emission effects. then reads:

$`\overline{𝐟}\left(x\right)`$ $`=`$ $`\delta \left(1x\right)+{\displaystyle _0^1}𝑑ϵ{\displaystyle _0^1}𝑑t\left[{\displaystyle \frac{A_1\alpha _S\left(Q^2ϵ^2t\right)+A_2\alpha _S^2\left(Q^2ϵ^2t\right)}{ϵt}}+{\displaystyle \frac{S_1\alpha _S\left(Q^2ϵ^2t\right)}{ϵ}}+{\displaystyle \frac{C_1\alpha _S\left(Q^2ϵ^2t\right)}{t}}\right]`$ (33)
$`\left[\delta \left(1xϵt\right)\delta \left(1x\right)\right].`$
This integral is no longer symmetric for $`\epsilon t`$ because of running coupling effects.

A consistent resummation to NLO accuracy (and beyond) is naturally performed in moment space, so that we consider :

$`\overline{𝐟}_N`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle _0^1}𝑑xx^{N1}\overline{𝐟}\left(x\right)`$ (34)
$`=`$ $`1+\mathrm{\Delta }\overline{𝐟}_N.`$
With this definition of the Mellin transform, the total rate is given by the first moment. Note that $`\overline{𝐟}_{N=1}=1.`$ The inverse transform to the original distribution in $`x`$-space is usually done numerically . The moments of the one-loop distribution $`\overline{𝐟}\left(x\right)`$ given in eq. (19) read:

$$\overline{𝐟}_n=1\frac{A_1\alpha _S}{2}\mathrm{log}^2nB_1\alpha _S\mathrm{log}n\frac{A_1\pi ^2}{12}\alpha _S+O\left(\frac{1}{n}\right).$$
(35)
We have defined $`nN/N_0,`$ where $`N_0e^{\gamma _E}=0.561459\mathrm{}`$ with $`\gamma _E=0.577216\mathrm{}`$ the Euler constant . The single logarithm, the $`\mathrm{log}n`$ term, is positive and tends to increase the rate, as is often the case . Its coefficient $`B_1`$ is rather big; it is over a factor of $`2`$ larger than in DIS, for example, where $`C_1`$ is the same and $`S_1=0.`$ Simple exponentiation of the effective one-gluon distribution takes place in $`N`$-space, so that

$$\overline{𝐟}_N=e^{\mathrm{\Delta }\overline{𝐟}_N}.$$
(36)
The non-logarithmic integrations of the terms proportional to $`S_1`$ and $`C_1`$ can be explicitly done  and one obtains:

$`\mathrm{log}\overline{𝐟}_N`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle _0^1}dx{\displaystyle \frac{x^{N1}1}{1x}}\{{\displaystyle _{Q^2(1x)^2}^{Q^2\left(1x\right)}}{\displaystyle \frac{dq^2}{q^2}}[A_1\alpha _S\left(q^2\right)+A_2\alpha _S^2\left(q^2\right)]+`$ (37)
$`+S_1\alpha _S\left(Q^2(1x)^2\right)+C_1\alpha _S\left(Q^2(1x)\right)\}+O(\alpha _S^n\mathrm{log}^{n1}N),`$
Using the large-$`N`$ approximation $`x^N1\theta \left(1x1/n\right)`$ 666The error in this approximation amounts to next-to-next-to-leading logarithms and to terms suppressed by powers of $`1/N.`$, the moments read:

$`\mathrm{log}\overline{𝐟}_n`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{A_1}{2\beta _0}}\left[\mathrm{log}s\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}s2\mathrm{log}{\displaystyle \frac{s}{n}}\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}{\displaystyle \frac{s}{n}}+\mathrm{log}{\displaystyle \frac{s}{n^2}}\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}{\displaystyle \frac{s}{n^2}}\right]+`$ (38)
$`+{\displaystyle \frac{\beta _0A_2\beta _1A_1}{2\beta _0^3}}\left[\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}s2\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}{\displaystyle \frac{s}{n}}+\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}{\displaystyle \frac{s}{n^2}}\right]+`$
$`{\displaystyle \frac{\beta _1A_1}{4\beta _0^3}}\left[\mathrm{log}^2\mathrm{log}s2\mathrm{log}^2\mathrm{log}{\displaystyle \frac{s}{n}}+\mathrm{log}^2\mathrm{log}{\displaystyle \frac{s}{n^2}}\right]+`$
$`{\displaystyle \frac{S_1}{2\beta _0}}\left[\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}s\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}{\displaystyle \frac{s}{n^2}}\right]{\displaystyle \frac{C_1}{\beta _0}}\left[\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}s\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}{\displaystyle \frac{s}{n}}\right],`$
where $`s`$ is the square of the hard scale in unit of the QCD scale,

$$s\frac{Q^2}{\mathrm{\Lambda }^2}.$$
(39)
Note that $`\overline{𝐟}_n=1`$ for $`n=1.`$ Substituting $`\mathrm{log}s`$ in eq. (38) by its expression in terms of the two-loop coupling,

$$\mathrm{log}s=\frac{1}{\beta _0\alpha _S}+\frac{\beta _1}{\beta _0^2}\mathrm{log}\left(\beta _0\alpha _S\right),$$
(40)
one obtains the exponent (38) as a series of functions :

$$\overline{𝐟}_n=\mathrm{exp}\left[Lg_1\left(\beta _0\alpha _SL\right)+g_2\left(\beta _0\alpha _SL\right)+\alpha _Sg_3\left(\beta _0\alpha _SL\right)+\mathrm{}\right],$$
(41)
where the leading and next-to-leading functions are respectively :

$`g_1\left(w\right)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{A_1}{2\beta _0}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{w}}\left[\left(12w\right)\mathrm{log}\left(12w\right)2\left(1w\right)\mathrm{log}\left(1w\right)\right];`$
$`g_2\left(w\right)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{\beta _0A_2\beta _1A_1}{2\beta _0^3}}\left[\mathrm{log}(12w)2\mathrm{log}(1w)\right]{\displaystyle \frac{\beta _1A_1}{4\beta _0^3}}\left[\mathrm{log}^2(12w)2\mathrm{log}^2(1w)\right]+`$ (42)
$`+{\displaystyle \frac{S_1}{2\beta _0}}\mathrm{log}(12w)+{\displaystyle \frac{C_1}{\beta _0}}\mathrm{log}(1w).`$
We have defined $`\alpha _S\alpha _S\left(Q^2\right)`$ and $`L\mathrm{log}n.`$ The two-loop terms coming from the expansion of the resummed distribution read:

$$\mathrm{log}\overline{𝐟}_n^{\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}\hspace{0.17em}2}loop}=\frac{1}{2}A_1\beta _0\alpha _S^2L^3\left(\frac{1}{2}A_2+\beta _0S_1+\frac{1}{2}\beta _0C_1\right)\alpha _S^2L^2.$$
(43)
The effective form factor is real — and therefore sensible — only for

$$n<n_{crit}=\mathrm{exp}\left[\frac{1}{2\beta _0\alpha _S\left(Q^2\right)}\right]\frac{Q}{\mathrm{\Lambda }}.$$
(44)
This restriction is induced by the soft terms — i.e. by those proportional to $`A_1,S_1`$ and $`A_2.`$ The reliability of the resummed result is then limited to

$$n\frac{Q}{\mathrm{\Lambda }}m^2\mathrm{\Lambda }Q.$$
(45)
The condition is the same as that in the leading order analysis. On the other hand, the hard collinear contribution — the term proportional to $`C_1`$ — remains well-defined up to much larger values of $`n:`$

$$nn_{crit}^2\frac{Q^2}{\mathrm{\Lambda }^2}m^2\mathrm{\Lambda }^2.$$
(46)
The collinear factor is therefore well-defined in the kinematic region (11) described by the shape function. It becomes singular only in the resonance or exclusive region $`m^2\mathrm{\Lambda }^2`$, which is well beyond the reach of the shape function.

Figure 1: Plot of the QCD form factor $`\overline{𝐟}_n`$ as a function of $`n`$ (first 24 moments) for the values of the parameters discussed in the text. Solid line: NLO distribution; dashed line: LO distribution; dotted line: expansion to order $`\alpha _S^2`$ of the exponent in the NLO distribution.

The LO and NLO form factors are plotted in fig. 1 for $`Q=m_B5.2`$ GeV, for which $`\alpha _S0.21`$ and $`n_{crit}\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}28}.`$ The NLO curve lies above the LO one and it exceeds one in the small-$`n`$ region because of the single logarithm, as already discussed. The two-loop curve lies above the NLO one because the leading terms in higher orders are all negative (cf. eqs. (35) and (43)).

The resummed distribution is usually written as :

$$𝐟_N\left(\alpha _S\right)=K\left(\alpha _S\right)\overline{𝐟}_N\left(\alpha _S\right)+D_N\left(\alpha _S\right),$$
(47)
where $`K`$ is a function with a power series expansion in $`\alpha _S:`$

$$K\left(\alpha _S\right)=1+k\alpha _S+k^{}\alpha _S^2+\mathrm{}$$
(48)
and $`D_N`$ is a remainder function:

$$D_N\left(\alpha _S\right)=d_N\alpha _S+d_N^{}\alpha _S^2+\mathrm{},$$
(49)
starting at order $`\alpha _S`$ and vanishing in the large-$`N`$ limit,

$$D_N\frac{1}{N}\mathrm{for}N\mathrm{}.$$
(50)
To NLO accuracy, the contributions of order $`\alpha _S`$ to the function $`K`$ (and $`D_N)`$ are needed. To the same accuracy, in place of (47), one can write $`𝐟_N=(1+\alpha _Sk+\alpha _Sd_N)\overline{𝐟}_N.`$

An expression analogous to (47) also holds for the distributions in the semileptonic decay (5) with a fixed hadronic energy, i.e. to differential distributions in the hadronic energy. One simply has to make the replacement

$$xz$$
(51)
in eq. (47) and to account for a dependence of $`K`$ and $`D_N`$ on $`Q/m_B.`$ The function $`\overline{𝐟}`$ is the same in the semileptonic and in the rare decay:

$$\overline{𝐟}\left(x\right)=\overline{𝐟}\left(z\right).$$
(52)
The general variable for the threshold region of heavy flavour decays is $`z,`$ even though, for the rare decay (4), it is more convenient to use $`x.`$ In the semi-inclusive region these two variables concide, because

$$1z=\frac{1x}{\left(2x\right)^2}=1x+O\left(\left(1x\right)^2\right).$$
(53)
## 3 The shape function

Let us now consider the quantity in the effective theory related to $`𝐟\left(z\right)`$, namely the shape function $`\phi \left(k_+\right).`$ The latter has the analogous decomposition:

$$\phi \left(k_+\right)=\overline{\phi }\left(k_+\right)+\alpha _Sh\delta \left(k_+\right)+\alpha _Sp\left(k_+\right).$$
(54)
The function $`\overline{\phi }\left(k_+\right)`$ factorizes long-distance effects and reads:

$`\overline{\phi }\left(k_+\right)`$ $`=`$ $`\delta \left(k_+\right)A_1\alpha _S{\displaystyle \frac{\theta (0;k_+;\mu )}{k_+}}\mathrm{log}{\displaystyle \frac{k_+}{\mu }}+A_1\alpha _S\delta \left(k_+\right){\displaystyle _\mu ^0}{\displaystyle \frac{dl_+}{l_+}}\mathrm{log}{\displaystyle \frac{l_+}{\mu }}+`$ (55)
$`+S_1\alpha _S{\displaystyle \frac{\theta (0;k_+;\mu )}{k_+}}S_1\alpha _S\delta \left(k_+\right){\displaystyle _\mu ^0}{\displaystyle \frac{dl_+}{l_+}},`$
where $`\mu 2\mathrm{\Lambda }_S`$ and we have defined $`\theta (a_1;a_2;\mathrm{}a_n)\theta \left(a_1a_2\right)\theta \left(a_2a_3\right)\mathrm{}\theta \left(a_{n1}a_n\right).`$ The regularization used  imposes a cut-off on the spatial loop momenta and not on the energies,

$$|\stackrel{}{l}|<\mathrm{\Lambda }_S,\mathrm{}<l_0<+\mathrm{},$$
(56)
and it is qualitatively similar to lattice regularization777By this we mean that the double logarithm at one loop is the same in the two regularizations.. Proceeding in a similar way, one can write:

$$\overline{\phi }\left(k_+\right)=\delta \left(k_+\right)+_0^\mu \frac{dE}{E}_0^1𝑑t\left[\frac{A_1\alpha _S\left(E^2t\right)+A_2\alpha _S^2\left(E^2t\right)}{t}+S_1\alpha _S\left(E^2t\right)\right]\left[\delta \left(k_++Et\right)\delta \left(k_+\right)\right].$$
(57)
A few comments are in order. The hard scale $`Q`$ does not appear in $`\overline{\phi }\left(k_+\right)`$, as it should. The term proportional to $`C_1`$ is absent because the shape function retains only the leading terms in the soft limit $`E0,`$ which are proportional to $`1/E.`$ With the same definition of the coupling constant in QCD and in the ET, the constant $`A_2`$ is the same in the two theories 888A difference would imply a breakdown of factorization.. Since $`k_+=Q\left(1z\right),`$ the shape function in the “QCD variable” $`z`$ reads:

$$\overline{f}\left(z\right)=\delta \left(1z\right)+_0^{1/r}\frac{dϵ}{ϵ}_0^1𝑑t\left[\frac{A_1\alpha _S\left(Q^2ϵ^2t\right)+A_2\alpha _S^2\left(Q^2ϵ^2t\right)}{t}+S_1\alpha _S\left(Q^2ϵ^2t\right)\right]\left[\delta \left(1zϵt\right)\delta \left(1z\right)\right],$$
(58)
where we have defined an adimensional function as

$$\overline{f}\left(z\right)Q\overline{\phi }\left(k_+\right).$$
(59)
The quantity $`r`$ is the ratio of the hard scale to the UV cut-off of the effective theory,

$$r\frac{Q}{\mu }>1,$$
(60)
because the shape function is defined in a low-energy effective field theory. To avoid substantial finite cut-off effects, one has also to assume

$$\mu \mathrm{\Lambda }.$$
(61)
Taking moments and exponentiating the one-loop distribution as in the QCD case, one obtains:

$$\overline{f}_N=e^{\mathrm{\Delta }\overline{f}_N}.$$
(62)
Figure 2: Plot of the shape function $`\overline{f}_n`$ (first 25 moments). Solid line: NLO distribution; dashed line: LO distribution; dotted line: expansion to order $`\alpha _S^2`$ of the exponent in the NLO distribution.

Making the same approximations as in the QCD case, the shape function is written:

$$\mathrm{log}\overline{f}_n=\theta \left(nr\right)_{1/n}^{1/r}\frac{dy}{y}\left\{_y^{1/r}\frac{dϵ}{ϵ}\left[A_1\alpha _S\left(Q^2ϵy\right)+A_2\alpha _S^2\left(Q^2ϵy\right)\right]+S_1\alpha _S\left(Q^2y^2\right)\right\}.$$
(63)
A straightforward integration then gives:

$`\mathrm{log}\overline{f}_n`$ $`=`$ $`\theta (nr)\{{\displaystyle \frac{A_1}{2\beta _0}}[\mathrm{log}{\displaystyle \frac{s}{n^2}}\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}{\displaystyle \frac{s}{n^2}}2\mathrm{log}{\displaystyle \frac{s}{rn}}\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}{\displaystyle \frac{s}{rn}}+\mathrm{log}{\displaystyle \frac{s}{r^2}}\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}{\displaystyle \frac{s}{r^2}}]+`$ (64)
$`+{\displaystyle \frac{A_2\beta _0A_1\beta _1}{2\beta _0^3}}\left[\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}{\displaystyle \frac{s}{n^2}}2\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}{\displaystyle \frac{s}{rn}}+\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}{\displaystyle \frac{s}{r^2}}\right]+`$
$`{\displaystyle \frac{A_1\beta _1}{4\beta _0^3}}[\mathrm{log}^2\mathrm{log}{\displaystyle \frac{s}{n^2}}2\mathrm{log}^2\mathrm{log}{\displaystyle \frac{s}{rn}}+\mathrm{log}^2\mathrm{log}{\displaystyle \frac{s}{r^2}}]+{\displaystyle \frac{S_1}{2\beta _0}}[\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}{\displaystyle \frac{s}{n^2}}\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}{\displaystyle \frac{s}{r^2}}]\}.`$
Figure 3: Comparison of QCD form factor with the shape function. Solid line: NLO QCD distribution; big dashed line: NLO shape function; small dashed line: LO QCD distribution; dotted line: LO shape function.

The main point is that the terms containing $`n^2`$ are independent of $`r:`$ the infrared behaviour is the same as in QCD, as expected on physical grounds. Substituting $`\mathrm{log}s`$ by its expression in terms of the two-loop coupling, the result reads:

$$\mathrm{log}\overline{f}_n=Lg_1^{ET}(\beta _0\alpha _SL;\beta _0\alpha _SR)+g_2^{ET}(\beta _0\alpha _SL;\beta _0\alpha _SR)+\mathrm{}$$

where:

$`g_1^{ET}(w;\tau )`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{A_1}{2\beta _0w}}\left[\left(12w\right)\mathrm{log}\left(12w\right)+\left(12\tau \right)\mathrm{log}\left(12\tau \right)2\left(1w\tau \right)\mathrm{log}\left(1w\tau \right)\right],`$
$`g_2^{ET}(w;\tau )`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{A_2\beta _0A_1\beta _1}{2\beta _0^3}}[\mathrm{log}(12w)+\mathrm{log}(12\tau )2\mathrm{log}(1w\tau ))]+`$ (65)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{A_1\beta _1}{4\beta _0^3}}\left[\mathrm{log}^2(12w)+\mathrm{log}^2(12\tau )2\mathrm{log}^2\left(1w\tau \right)\right]+`$
$`+{\displaystyle \frac{S_1}{2\beta _0}}\left[\mathrm{log}(12w)\mathrm{log}(12\tau )\right],`$
and

$$R\mathrm{log}r>0,$$
(66)
and the over-all factor $`\theta \left(LR\right)`$ has been omitted. Note that $`\overline{f}_n`$ is continuous at $`n=r,`$ but it has a cusp singularity in this point. The range of $`n`$ is restricted by eq. (45): the same limitation of the QCD distribution occurs. The QCD form factor $`\overline{𝐟}_n,`$ except for the $`C_1`$ term, is obtained by taking $`\tau =0`$ in the above expression, i.e. letting the gluon energy to reach the hard scale. The shape function is plotted in fig. 2 for the same values of the parameters of the QCD distribution and for $`\mu =2`$GeV. In fig. 3 we compare the QCD form factor with the shape function. In NLO, the shape-function curve is below the QCD one for small $`n`$ because it has no $`C_1`$ term. NLO distributions are very close to each other for large $`n,`$ but this seems accidental; indeed, this phenomenon does not occur for the LO distributions. In general, the shape-function curves look somehow shifted with respect to the corresponding QCD ones.

The moments of the shape function can be decomposed in a form similar to the QCD distribution:

$$f_N\left(\alpha _S\right)=H\left(\alpha _S\right)\overline{f}_N\left(\alpha _S\right)+P_N\left(\alpha _S\right),$$
(67)
where the functions $`H\left(\alpha _S\right)`$ and $`P_N\left(\alpha _S\right)`$ have a power series expansion in $`\alpha _S:`$

$`H\left(\alpha _S\right)`$ $`=`$ $`1+h\alpha _S+h^{}\alpha _S^2+\mathrm{}`$
$`P_N\left(\alpha _S\right)`$ $`=`$ $`p_N\alpha _S+p_N^{}\alpha _S+\mathrm{}.`$ (68)
To NLO accuracy, an expression alternative to (67) including higher-twist effects is $`f_N=\left(1+\alpha _Sh+\alpha _Sp_N\right)\overline{f}_N.`$

## 4 The coefficient function

We introduce the coefficient function $`C_N`$ relating the shape function to the QCD form factor, as

$$𝐟_N=C_Nf_N.$$
(69)
Inserting the expressions previously obtained and neglecting the remainder functions $`D_N`$ and $`P_N`$, the coefficient function reads:

$$C_N\left(\alpha _S\right)=G\left(\alpha _S\right)\mathrm{\Sigma }_N\left(\alpha _S\right),$$
(70)
where

$$G\left(\alpha _S\right)=\frac{K\left(\alpha _S\right)}{H\left(\alpha _S\right)}=1+g\alpha _S+\mathrm{}$$
(71)
and

$$\mathrm{\Sigma }_N\left(\alpha _S\right)=\frac{\overline{𝐟}_N\left(\alpha _S\right)}{\overline{f}_N\left(\alpha _S\right)}$$
(72)
with $`g=kh.`$ To NLO accuracy, the replacement $`G\left(\alpha _S\right)1+\alpha _Sg+\alpha _S\left(d_Np_N\right)`$ is allowed, including also the remainder terms. The QCD distribution and the shape function are related by a convolution in momentum space:

$$𝐟\left(z\right)=_0^1_0^1𝑑z^{}𝑑z^{\prime \prime }\delta \left(zz^{}z^{\prime \prime }\right)C\left(z^{}\right)f\left(z^{\prime \prime }\right).$$
(73)
The function $`\mathrm{\Sigma }_n`$ reads:

$$\mathrm{log}\mathrm{\Sigma }_n=\theta \left(rn\right)\mathrm{log}\overline{𝐟}_n+\theta \left(nr\right)\left[\mathrm{log}\overline{𝐟}_n\mathrm{log}\overline{f}_n\right].$$
(74)
The explicit expression for $`n>r`$ is:

$$\mathrm{log}\mathrm{\Sigma }_n=Lg_1^{CF}(\beta _0\alpha _SL;\beta _0\alpha _SR)+g_2^{CF}(\beta _0\alpha _SL;\beta _0\alpha _SR)+\mathrm{},$$
(75)
where

$`g_1^{CF}(w;\tau )`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{A_1}{2\beta _0w}}\left[2\left(1w\tau \right)\mathrm{log}\left(1w\tau \right)2\left(1w\right)\mathrm{log}\left(1w\right)\left(12\tau \right)\mathrm{log}\left(12\tau \right)\right];`$
$`g_2^{CF}(w;\tau )`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{A_2\beta _0A_1\beta _1}{2\beta _0^3}}\left[2\mathrm{log}\left(1w\tau \right)2\mathrm{log}(1w)\mathrm{log}\left(12\tau \right)\right]+`$ (76)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{A_1\beta _1}{4\beta _0^3}}\left[2\mathrm{log}^2\left(1w\tau \right)2\mathrm{log}^2(1w)\mathrm{log}^2(12\tau )\right]+`$
$`+{\displaystyle \frac{S_1}{2\beta _0}}\mathrm{log}(12\tau )+{\displaystyle \frac{C_1}{\beta _0}}\mathrm{log}(1w).`$
Figure 4: Plot of the coefficient function $`\mathrm{\Sigma }_n`$ for the choice of the parameters discussed previously (first 140 moments). Solid line: NLO distribution; dashed line: LO distribution; dotted line: expansion to order $`\alpha _S^2`$ of the exponent in the NLO distribution.

Equation (76) is our main result. Let us comment on it. The terms most affected by long-distance effects are those containing the combination $`12w`$ and they are the same in QCD and in the ET. As a consequence, they cancel in the difference, proving that the coefficient function is short-distance-dominated to NLO accuracy; we believe that this cancellation occurs to any order in PT. The coefficient function is meaningful up to

$$nn_{crit}^{}=\frac{\mu }{Q}\mathrm{exp}\left[\frac{1}{\beta _0\alpha _S\left(Q^2\right)}\right]\frac{\mu Q}{\mathrm{\Lambda }^2}.$$
(77)
Note that $`n_{crit}^{}`$ lies between the critical values for the soft terms and the hard collinear one:

$$n_{crit}n_{crit}^{}n_{crit}^2.$$
(78)
The coefficient function contains also the jet factor, entirely coming from the QCD form factor:

$$J_n=\mathrm{exp}\left[\frac{C_1}{\beta _0}\mathrm{log}(1w)\right].$$
(79)
Figure 5: Comparison of the coefficient function with the QCD form factor. Solid line: NLO coefficient function; big dashed line: NLO QCD distribution; small dashed line: LO coefficient function; dotted line: LO QCD distribution.

The coefficient function is plotted in fig. 4 for the values of the parameters specified previously. It becomes singular at $`n_{crit}^{}297,`$ i.e. an order of magnitude above the QCD form factor or the shape function. For $`n50,`$ the NLO curve has a shape similar to the LO one and it is shifted up with respect to the latter by $`0.2.`$ In fig. 5 we compare the coefficient function with the QCD form factor. Note that the large-$`N`$ approximation produces a cusp singularity in the NLO coefficient function at $`n=r.`$

The computation of the shape function from first principles — namely lattice QCD — requires a large amount of theoretical work, consisting of the following steps:

1. analytic continuation from Euclidean to Minkowski space of the relevant correlation function, a 4-point function;
2. lattice regularization of the effective theory in which the shape function is defined, which involves the HQET (Wilson lines off the light cone) and the LEET (Wilson lines on the light-cone);
3. computation of the shape function in lattice perturbation theory to full order $`\alpha _S;`$
4. matching of the lattice shape function with the QCD distribution to full order $`\alpha _S;`$
5. Numerical computation with a Monte Carlo program of the correlation function on the lattice.

The first step was taken in ref. , showing the possibility of a lattice computation of the shape function. Step 2 has only partially been completed: the lattice HQET has been formulated in ref.  while the lattice LEET — as far as we know — has not been constructed yet. The main difference is that, in the latter case, not only soft singularities but also light-cone singularities appear in the euclidean correlation functions; we do not attempt at the construction of the lattice LEET here. No theoretical work exists — as far as we know — on points 3, 4 and 5. In general, a lot of work is yet to be done: the purpose of this note was simply showing how to resum to all orders the threshold logarithms appearing in the coefficient function.

Our result (76) applies to the coefficient function of the shape function defined in lattice regularization , after the identification is done:

$$\frac{1}{a}=c\mu ,$$
(80)
where $`c`$ is a constant or order 1 and $`a`$ is the lattice spacing. $`c`$ is determined, for example, imposing the equality of the coefficients of the single logarithms in the lattice shape function and in eq. (54) (steps 3 and 4). In our work, we have assumed the consistency of the lattice LEET and the knowledge of the one-loop lattice amplitude.

In the absence of a (non-perturbative) computation of the shape function, we can compare our coefficient function evaluated with a cut-off of a few times the hadronic scale (in practice $`1÷2`$ GeV) directly with the experimental data. The mismatch is the non-perturbative component up to a scale $`\mu ,`$ namely the shape function. The factorization scale $`\mu `$ acts effectively in the coefficient function as a prescription for the Landau pole. In this respect, our coefficient function can be considered as a complete QCD form factor, with a prescription to remove the Landau pole outside region (11). As we have seen, the singularity is not completely removed, but it is shifted to much larger values of $`N.`$ We stress that our splitting of the QCD form factor into a coefficient function and a shape function represents a consistent separation of perturbative from non-perturbative effects; it somehow differs from the usual strategy of finding a good prescription for the running coupling in the non-perturbative region.

## 5 Conclusions

We have presented a NLO evaluation of the resummed coefficient function for the shape function. Our result, together with a one-loop lattice computation that is still missing, allows relating the shape function computed with lattice QCD to distributions in heavy-flavour decays in the semi-inclusive region (11). The NLO analysis corroborates the results of the leading order one, but it does not reveal any new qualitative feature. The coefficient function is short-distance-dominated in the relevant region (11), and corrections to factorization are expected to be of the order $`\mathrm{\Lambda }/\mu ,`$ i.e. to involve one inverse power of the factorization scale. The NLO coefficient function contains also a jet factor that takes into account the emission of hard collinear gluons. The latter process is indeed not described by the effective theory, which takes into account only soft emission up to the scale $`\mu .`$ On the quantitative side, NLO effects increase the coefficient function by $`20`$% for $`\mu =2`$ GeV and $`n50`$ in the case of $`B`$ decays.

In general, the process (1) contains three different scales:999I wish to thank G. Korchemsky for a discussion on this point.

$`i)Q^2`$ $``$ $`\mathrm{\Lambda }^2,`$
$`ii)Qk_+`$ $``$ $`Q\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }^2,`$
$`iii)k_+^2`$ $``$ $`\mathrm{\Lambda }^2.`$ (81)
The emission of gluons with transverse momenta ranging between $`i)`$ and $`ii)`$ is reliably computed in perturbation theory, while fluctuations in region $`iii)`$ ask for a non-perturbative treatment. With factorization by means of the shape function, another scale is introduced in the problem, intermediate between $`ii)`$ and $`iii):`$

$$iv)\mu k_+\mu \mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }^2.$$
(82)
The fluctuations between scales $`iii)`$ and $`iv)`$ are factorized in the shape function. The general idea behind the shape-function approach is that soft contributions are more “non-perturbative” than collinear ones in double-logarithmic problems in region (11), because they involve smaller transverse momenta. These soft non-perturbative effects can be represented as hadronic matrix elements of non-local operators involving Wilson lines. For a given process, one identifies a dominant kinematical configuration and replaces the hard partons with Wilson lines with the same momenta.

To summarize, we have presented a NLO evaluation of the resummed coefficient function of the shape function, which confirms the consistency of the effective theory approach and allows a more accurate theoretical analysis.

Acknowledgements

I wish to thank in particular G. Ricciardi for having checked part of the computation and S. Catani for suggestions. I also thank A. Banfi, M. Cacciari, M. Ciafaloni, M. Ciuchini, D. De Florian, P. Gambino, E. Gardi, M. Grazzini, T. Hurth and P. Nason for discussions.