First estimate of the NNLO nonresonant corrections to top-antitop threshold production at lepton colliders

We compute the dominant term in the expansion in rho=1-M_W/m_t of the unknown next-to-next-to-leading order (NNLO) nonresonant contributions to the e+ e- -> W+ W- b bbar total cross section at energies close to the top-antitop threshold. Our analytic result disagrees with a previous calculation by other authors [1]. We show that our determination has the correct infrared structure needed to cancel the divergences proportional to the top width arising in the resonant production of the same final state, and we point out to a missing contribution in the computation of [1] to explain the discrepancy.