DRELL-YAN FORWARD-BACKWARD AND SPIN ASYMMETRIES FOR ARBITRARY VECTOR BOSON PRODUCTION AT NEXT-TO-LEADING ORDER

Longitudinally polarized, unpolarized and forward-backward mass differ ential cross sections for Drell-Yan lepton-pair production by arbitrar y vector bosons are calculated in next-to-leading order (NLO) QCD. Ana lytical results are presented in a form valid for all consistent n-dim ensional regularization schemes, with the mass factorization scheme ke pt general. NLO predictions for all Drell-Yan type processes (W+/-, Z and y) at BNL's Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC) are made using polarized parton distributions which fit the recent deep-inelastic sc attering data. These are examined as tools in the determination of the polarized parton distributions and the unpolarized (u) over bar/(d) o ver bar ratio. NLO predictions for the forward-backward lepton asymmet ry at Fermilab are made and the precision determination of sin(2) thet a(W) from future runs is studied. In all the above, the QCD correction s are found to be significant. An introductory discussion is given of various theoretical issues, such as allowable factorization and regula rization schemes, and scale dependences.