In this paper we consider signal-background interference effects in Higgs-mediated diphoton production at the LHC. After reviewing earlier works that show how to use these effects to constrain the Higgs boson total decay width, we provide predictions beyond NLO accuracy for the interference and related observables, and study the impact of QCD radiative corrections on the Higgs width determination. In particular, we use the so-called soft-virtual approximation to estimate interference effects at NNLO in QCD. The inclusion of these effects reduces the NNLO prediction for the total Higgs cross-section in the diphoton channel by about 1.7%. We study in detail the impact of QCD corrections on the Higgs-boson line-shape and its implications for the Higgs boson width extraction. In particular, we find that the shift of the Higgs resonance peak arising from interference effects gets reduced by about 30% with respect to the NLO prediction. Assuming an experimental resolution of about 150
Measurement of the Higgs boson width and evidence of its off-shell contributions to ZZ production
Abstract Since the discovery of the Higgs boson in 2012, detailed studies of its properties have been ongoing. Besides its mass, its width—related to its lifetime—is an important parameter. One way to determine this quantity is to measure its off-shell production, where the Higgs boson mass is far away from its nominal value, and relating it to its on-shell production, where the mass is close to the nominal value. Here we report evidence for such off-shell contributions to the production cross-section of two Z bosons with data from the CMS experiment at the CERN Large Hadron Collider. We constrain the total rate of the off-shell Higgs boson contribution beyond the Z boson pair production threshold, relative to its standard model expectation, to the interval [0.0061, 2.0] at the 95% confidence level. The scenario with no off-shell contribution is excluded at a p -value of 0.0003 (3.6 standard deviations). We measure the width of the Higgs boson as $${{{\varGamma }}}_{{{{{{\rm{H}}}}}}}={3.2}_{-1.7}^{+2.4}\,{{{{{\rm{MeV}}}}}}$$ Γ H = 3.2 − 1.7 + 2.4 MeV , in agreement with the standard model expectation of 4.1 MeV. In addition, we set constraints on anomalous Higgs boson couplings to W and Z boson pairs.
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- NSF-PAR ID:
- 10420362
- Author(s) / Creator(s):
- ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; more »
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Nature Physics
- Volume:
- 18
- Issue:
- 11
- ISSN:
- 1745-2473
- Page Range / eLocation ID:
- 1329 to 1334
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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Abstract $$\textrm{MeV}$$ -
null (Ed.)Abstract Production cross sections of the Higgs boson are measured in the $${\mathrm{H}} \rightarrow {\mathrm{Z}} {\mathrm{Z}} \rightarrow 4\ell $$ H → Z Z → 4 ℓ ( $$\ell ={\mathrm{e}},{{{\upmu }}_{\mathrm{}}^{\mathrm{}}} $$ ℓ = e , μ ) decay channel. A data sample of proton–proton collisions at a center-of-mass energy of 13 $$\,\text {Te}\text {V}$$ Te , collected by the CMS detector at the LHC and corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 137 $$\,\text {fb}^{-1}$$ fb - 1 is used. The signal strength modifier $$\mu $$ μ , defined as the ratio of the Higgs boson production rate in the $$4\ell $$ 4 ℓ channel to the standard model (SM) expectation, is measured to be $$\mu =0.94 \pm 0.07 \,\text {(stat)} ^{+0.09}_{-0.08} \,\text {(syst)} $$ μ = 0.94 ± 0.07 (stat) - 0.08 + 0.09 (syst) at a fixed value of $$m_{{\mathrm{H}}} = 125.38\,\text {Ge}\text {V} $$ m H = 125.38 Ge . The signal strength modifiers for the individual Higgs boson production modes are also reported. The inclusive fiducial cross section for the $${\mathrm{H}} \rightarrow 4\ell $$ H → 4 ℓ process is measured to be $$2.84^{+0.23}_{-0.22} \,\text {(stat)} ^{+0.26}_{-0.21} \,\text {(syst)} \,\text {fb} $$ 2 . 84 - 0.22 + 0.23 (stat) - 0.21 + 0.26 (syst) fb , which is compatible with the SM prediction of $$2.84 \pm 0.15 \,\text {fb} $$ 2.84 ± 0.15 fb for the same fiducial region. Differential cross sections as a function of the transverse momentum and rapidity of the Higgs boson, the number of associated jets, and the transverse momentum of the leading associated jet are measured. A new set of cross section measurements in mutually exclusive categories targeted to identify production mechanisms and kinematical features of the events is presented. The results are in agreement with the SM predictions.more » « less
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null (Ed.)Abstract The rate for Higgs ( $${\mathrm{H}} $$ H ) bosons production in association with either one ( $${\mathrm{t}} {\mathrm{H}} $$ t H ) or two ( $${\mathrm{t}} {{\overline{{{\mathrm{t}}}}}} {\mathrm{H}} $$ t t ¯ H ) top quarks is measured in final states containing multiple electrons, muons, or tau leptons decaying to hadrons and a neutrino, using proton–proton collisions recorded at a center-of-mass energy of $$13\,\text {TeV} $$ 13 TeV by the CMS experiment. The analyzed data correspond to an integrated luminosity of 137 $$\,\text {fb}^{-1}$$ fb - 1 . The analysis is aimed at events that contain $${\mathrm{H}} \rightarrow {\mathrm{W}} {\mathrm{W}} $$ H → W W , $${\mathrm{H}} \rightarrow {\uptau } {\uptau } $$ H → τ τ , or $${\mathrm{H}} \rightarrow {\mathrm{Z}} {\mathrm{Z}} $$ H → Z Z decays and each of the top quark(s) decays either to lepton+jets or all-jet channels. Sensitivity to signal is maximized by including ten signatures in the analysis, depending on the lepton multiplicity. The separation among $${\mathrm{t}} {\mathrm{H}} $$ t H , $${\mathrm{t}} {{\overline{{{\mathrm{t}}}}}} {\mathrm{H}} $$ t t ¯ H , and the backgrounds is enhanced through machine-learning techniques and matrix-element methods. The measured production rates for the $${\mathrm{t}} {{\overline{{{\mathrm{t}}}}}} {\mathrm{H}} $$ t t ¯ H and $${\mathrm{t}} {\mathrm{H}} $$ t H signals correspond to $$0.92 \pm 0.19\,\text {(stat)} ^{+0.17}_{-0.13}\,\text {(syst)} $$ 0.92 ± 0.19 (stat) - 0.13 + 0.17 (syst) and $$5.7 \pm 2.7\,\text {(stat)} \pm 3.0\,\text {(syst)} $$ 5.7 ± 2.7 (stat) ± 3.0 (syst) of their respective standard model (SM) expectations. The corresponding observed (expected) significance amounts to 4.7 (5.2) standard deviations for $${\mathrm{t}} {{\overline{{{\mathrm{t}}}}}} {\mathrm{H}} $$ t t ¯ H , and to 1.4 (0.3) for $${\mathrm{t}} {\mathrm{H}} $$ t H production. Assuming that the Higgs boson coupling to the tau lepton is equal in strength to its expectation in the SM, the coupling $$y_{{\mathrm{t}}}$$ y t of the Higgs boson to the top quark divided by its SM expectation, $$\kappa _{{\mathrm{t}}}=y_{{\mathrm{t}}}/y_{{\mathrm{t}}}^{\mathrm {SM}}$$ κ t = y t / y t SM , is constrained to be within $$-0.9< \kappa _{{\mathrm{t}}}< -0.7$$ - 0.9 < κ t < - 0.7 or $$0.7< \kappa _{{\mathrm{t}}}< 1.1$$ 0.7 < κ t < 1.1 , at 95% confidence level. This result is the most sensitive measurement of the $${\mathrm{t}} {{\overline{{{\mathrm{t}}}}}} {\mathrm{H}} $$ t t ¯ H production rate to date.more » « less
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null (Ed.)A bstract A search for standard model Higgs bosons (H) produced with transverse momentum ( p T ) greater than 450 GeV and decaying to bottom quark-antiquark pairs ( $$ \mathrm{b}\overline{\mathrm{b}} $$ b b ¯ ) is performed using proton-proton collision data collected by the CMS experiment at the LHC at $$ \sqrt{s} $$ s = 13 TeV. The data sample corresponds to an integrated luminosity of 137 fb − 1 . The search is inclusive in the Higgs boson production mode. Highly Lorentz-boosted Higgs bosons decaying to $$ \mathrm{b}\overline{\mathrm{b}} $$ b b ¯ are reconstructed as single large-radius jets, and are identified using jet substructure and a dedicated b tagging technique based on a deep neural network. The method is validated with Z → $$ \mathrm{b}\overline{\mathrm{b}} $$ b b ¯ decays. For a Higgs boson mass of 125 GeV, an excess of events above the background assuming no Higgs boson production is observed with a local significance of 2.5 standard deviations ( σ ), while the expectation is 0.7. The corresponding signal strength and local significance with respect to the standard model expectation are μ H = 3 . 7 ± 1 . 2(stat) $$ {}_{-0.7}^{+0.8} $$ − 0.7 + 0.8 (syst) $$ {}_{-0.5}^{+0.8} $$ − 0.5 + 0.8 (theo) and 1 . 9 σ . Additionally, an unfolded differential cross section as a function of Higgs boson p T for the gluon fusion production mode is presented, assuming the other production modes occur at the expected rates.more » « less
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Abstract This paper reports a search for Higgs boson pair (
hh ) production in association with a vector boson ($$W\; {\text {o}r}\; Z$$ $$^{-1}$$ $$\sqrt{s}=13\,\text {TeV}$$ $$W\rightarrow \ell \nu ,\, Z\rightarrow \ell \ell ,\nu \nu $$ $$\ell =e, \mu $$ b -quarks. It targetsVhh signals from both non-resonanthh production, present in the Standard Model (SM), and resonanthh production, as predicted in some SM extensions. A 95% confidence-level upper limit of 183 (87) times the SM cross-section is observed (expected) for non-resonantVhh production when assuming the kinematics are as expected in the SM. Constraints are also placed on Higgs boson coupling modifiers. For the resonant search, upper limits on the production cross-sections are derived for two specific models: one is the production of a vector boson along with a neutral heavy scalar resonanceH , in the mass range 260–1000 GeV, that decays intohh , and the other is the production of a heavier neutral pseudoscalar resonanceA that decays into aZ boson andH boson, where theA boson mass is 360–800 GeV and theH boson mass is 260–400 GeV. Constraints are also derived in the parameter space of two-Higgs-doublet models.
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Accepted Manuscript1.0
- Journal Article:
- https://doi.org/10.1038/s41567-022-01682-0
