High-order corrections and subleading logarithms for top quark production - art. no. 014009

We derive high-order threshold corrections for top quark production in hadr onic collisions from resummation calculations. We present analytical expres sions for the cross section through next-to-next-to-next-to-next-to-leading order and next-to-next-to-leading logarithmic accuracy. Special attention is paid to the role of subleading logarithms and how they relate to the con vergence of the perturbation series and differences between various resumma tion prescriptions. It is shown that care must be taken to avoid unphysical terms in the expansions. Numerical results are presented for top quark pro duction at the Fermilab Tevatron. We find sizable increases to the total cr oss section and differential distributions and a dramatic reduction of the factorization scale dependence relative to next-to-leading order.