TOP-QUARK WIDTH - THEORETICAL UPDATE (VOL 48, PG 1910, 1993)

A critical assessment of the available calculations of the top quark width is presented. QCD corrections, the finite mass of the b quark, and the effect of the W width are included as well as the electroweak corrections. The relative importance of these corrections is demonstrated for a realistic range of top quark masses. For the QCD corrected decay rate we use the formulas previously derived by the authors and include the electroweak correction taken from Denner and Sack. Our results differ from those available in the literature because all the later calculations ignored the effect of the W width discussed in our earlier work. This leads to an effect comparable, in size to the electroweak correction.