The virtual photon–gluon impact factor with massive quarks and exact gluon kinematics

AbstractWe calculate the impact factor coupling a virtual photon to a gluon via a massive quark–antiquark pair at LL order, but with the imposition of the correct gluon kinematics. Exact analytical results are presented in triple Mellin space with respect to scaled Bjorken x, gluon transverse momentum and heavy quark mass. The application of these results to the calculation of approximate NLL coefficient functions needed to relate structure functions to the BFKL gluon is presented. The NLL effects with running coupling are seen to lead to a suppression of the small x divergence when compared with the fixed and running coupling LL results, but less than in the massless case