Differentiating the strong coupling constant gives
Integrate this constant derivative and express the integration constant through the strong-coupling scale at which the one-loop inverse coupling vanishes. The one-loop running of the strong coupling is
The positive-coupling branch has and is perturbatively reliable only when the logarithm is sufficiently large. The pole at signals failure of the one-loop expansion, not a prediction of a physically infinite observable. Equivalently, is scale-independent to this order; this is dimensional transmutation.