What is the Top Quark Mass?

Abstract

In this review I give an overview on the conceptual issues involved in the question how to interpret so-called `direct top quark mass measurements', which are based on the kinematic reconstruction of top quark decay products at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). These measurements quote the top mass parameter $m_t^{\mathrm{MC}}$ of Monte-Carlo event generators with current uncertainties of around $0.5$ GeV. At present time the problem of finding a rigorous relation between $m_t^{\mathrm{MC}}$ and top mass renormalization schemes defined in field theory is unresolved and touches perturbative as well as nonperturbative aspects and the limitations of state-of-the-art Monte-Carlo event generators. I review the status of LHC top mass measurements, illustrate how conceptual limitations enter and explain a controversy that has permeated the community in the context of the interpretation problem. Recent advances in acquiring first principle insights are summarized, and it is outlined what else has to be understood to fully resolve the issue. For the time being, I give a recommendation how to deal with the interpretation problem when making top mass dependent theoretical predictions.

23 pages, 10 figures; Invited review prepared for Annual Review of Nuclear and Particle Science 70 (2020)

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