Three- and four-jet final states in photoproduction at HERA

Abstract

Three- and four-jet final states have been measured in photoproduction at HERA using the ZEUS detector with an integrated luminosity of 121 pb^-1. The results are presented for jets with transverse energy E_T^jet>6 GeV and pseudorapidity |eta^jet|50 GeV, where M_nj is the invariant mass of the n-jet system. The four-jet photoproduction cross section has been measured for the first time and represents the highest-order process studied at HERA. Both the three- and four-jet cross sections have been compared with leading-logarithmic parton-shower Monte Carlo models, with and without multi-parton interactions. The three-jet cross sections have been compared to an order(alpha alpha_s^2) perturbative QCD calculation.