Partonic scattering cross sections in the QCD medium

A medium modified gluon propagator is used to evaluate the scattering cross section for the process gg --> gg in the QCD medium by performing an expli cit sum over the polarizations of the gluons. We incorporate a magnetic scr eening mass from a non-perturbative study. It is shown that the medium modi fied cross section is finite, divergence free, and is independent of any ad -hoc momentum transfer cut-off parameters. The medium modified finite cross sections are necessary for a realistic investigation of the production and equilibration of the minijet plasma expected at RFHC and LHC. (C) 2001 Pub lished by Elsevier Science B.V.