Revisiting transverse momentum broadening in dense QCD media

Abstract

We reconsider the problem of transverse momentum broadening of a highly energetic parton suffering multiple scatterings in dense colored media, such as the thermal quark-gluon plasma or large nuclei. In the framework of Molière’s theory of multiple scattering we rederive a simple analytic formula, to be used in jet quenching phenomenology, that accounts for both the multiple soft and hard Rutherford scattering regimes. Further, we discuss the sensitivity of momentum broadening to modeling of the nonperturbative infrared sector by presenting a detailed analytic and numerical comparison between the two widely used models in phenomenology: the Hard Thermal Loop and the Gyulassy-Wang potentials. We show that for the relevant values of the parameters the nonuniversal, model dependent contributions are negligible at LHC, RHIC and EIC energies, thus consolidating the predictive power of jet quenching theory.