Hard photon next-to-leading corrections to two-fermion production in e + e − collisions above the Z 0 peak

A complete next-to-leading order calculation of the initial-state O (α) photonic corrections to hadron and lepton-pair production in e ⁺ e ^?. collisions is presented. The impact of the next-to-leading order corrections on the twofermion cross section and forward-backward asymmetry is studied in detail for several event selections, with special emphasis on hard photon effects at LEP1.5 and LEP2 energies. It is shown that for typical realistic event selections, initial-state next-to-leading order corrections in the soft approximation can be safely extrapolated to energies above the Z ⁰ peak without significant loss of precision.