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1. Search for Higgs boson decays to a Z boson and a photon in proton-proton collisions at $$ \sqrt{s} $$ = 13 TeV

   https://doi.org/10.1007/JHEP05(2023)233  

   Tumasyan, A.; Adam, W.; Andrejkovic, J. W.; Bergauer, T.; Chatterjee, S.; Damanakis, K.; Dragicevic, M.; Escalante Del Valle, A.; Frühwirth, R.; Jeitler, M.; et al (May 2023, Journal of High Energy Physics)

   A<sc>bstract</sc> Results are presented from a search for the Higgs boson decay H→Zγ, where Z→ ℓ⁺ℓ⁻withℓ= e or μ. The search is performed using a sample of proton-proton (pp) collision data at a center-of-mass energy of 13 TeV, recorded by the CMS experiment at the LHC, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 138 fb⁻¹. Events are assigned to mutually exclusive categories, which exploit differences in both event topology and kinematics of distinct Higgs production mechanisms to enhance signal sensitivity. The signal strengthμ, defined as the product of the cross section and the branching fraction$$ \left[\sigma \left(\textrm{pp}\to \textrm{H}\right)\mathcal{B}\left(\textrm{H}\to \textrm{Z}\upgamma \right)\right] $$ $\left(\sigma \left(\mathrm{pp}\to H\right)B\left(H\to \mathrm{Z\gamma }\right)\right)$relative to the standard model prediction, is extracted from a simultaneous fit to theℓ⁺ℓ⁻γ invariant mass distributions in all categories and is measured to beμ= 2.4 ± 0.9 for a Higgs boson mass of 125.38 GeV. The statistical significance of the observed excess of events is 2.7 standard deviations. This measurement corresponds to$$ \left[\sigma \left(\textrm{pp}\to \textrm{H}\right)\mathcal{B}\left(\textrm{H}\to \textrm{Z}\upgamma \right)\right]=0.21\pm 0.08 $$ $\left(\sigma \left(\mathrm{pp}\to H\right)B\left(H\to \mathrm{Z\gamma }\right)\right)=0.21\pm 0.08$pb. The observed (expected) upper limit at 95% confidence level onμis 4.1 (1.8), where the expected limit is calculated under the background-only hypothesis. The ratio of branching fractions$$ \mathcal{B}\left(\textrm{H}\to \textrm{Z}\upgamma \right)/\mathcal{B}\left(\textrm{H}\to \upgamma \upgamma \right) $$ $B\left(H\to \mathrm{Z\gamma }\right)/B\left(H\to \mathrm{\gamma \gamma }\right)$is measured to be$$ {1.5}_{-0.6}^{+0.7} $$ ${1.5}_{-0.6}^{+0.7}$, which agrees with the standard model prediction of 0.69 ± 0.04 at the 1.5 standard deviation level. 

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2. Measurement of the τ lepton polarization in Z boson decays in proton-proton collisions at $$ \sqrt{s} $$ = 13 TeV

   https://doi.org/10.1007/JHEP01(2024)101  

   Hayrapetyan, A; Tumasyan, A; Adam, W; Andrejkovic, J W; Bergauer, T; Chatterjee, S; Damanakis, K; Dragicevic, M; Escalante_Del_Valle, A; Hussain, P S; et al (January 2024, Journal of High Energy Physics)

   A<sc>bstract</sc> The polarization ofτleptons is measured using leptonic and hadronicτlepton decays in Z →τ⁺τ⁻events in proton-proton collisions at$$ \sqrt{s} $$ $\sqrt{s}$= 13 TeV recorded by CMS at the CERN LHC with an integrated luminosity of 36.3 fb⁻¹. The measuredτ⁻lepton polarization at the Z boson mass pole is$$ {\mathcal{P}}_{\tau}\left(\textrm{Z}\right) $$ $P_{\tau }\left(Z\right)$= −0.144 ± 0.006 (stat) ± 0.014 (syst) = −0.144 ± 0.015, in good agreement with the measurement of theτlepton asymmetry parameter ofA_τ= 0.1439 ± 0.0043 =$$ -{\mathcal{P}}_{\tau}\left(\textrm{Z}\right) $$ $-P_{\tau }\left(Z\right)$at LEP. Theτlepton polarization depends on the ratio of the vector to axial-vector couplings of theτleptons in the neutral current expression, and thus on the effective weak mixing angle sin²$$ {\theta}_{\textrm{W}}^{\textrm{eff}} $$ ${\theta }_W^{\mathrm{eff}}$, independently of the Z boson production mechanism. The obtained value sin²$$ {\theta}_{\textrm{W}}^{\textrm{eff}} $$ ${\theta }_W^{\mathrm{eff}}$= 0.2319 ± 0.0008(stat) ± 0.0018(syst) = 0.2319 ± 0.0019 is in good agreement with measurements ate⁺e⁻colliders. 

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3. Charged-particle production as a function of the relative transverse activity classifier in pp, p–Pb, and Pb–Pb collisions at the LHC

   https://doi.org/10.1007/JHEP01(2024)056  

   Acharya, S; Adamová, D; Aglieri_Rinella, G; Agnello, M; Agrawal, N; Ahammed, Z; Ahmad, S; Ahn, S U; Ahuja, I; Akindinov, A; et al (January 2024, Journal of High Energy Physics)

   A<sc>bstract</sc> Measurements of charged-particle production in pp, p–Pb, and Pb–Pb collisions in the toward, away, and transverse regions with the ALICE detector are discussed. These regions are defined event-by-event relative to the azimuthal direction of the charged trigger particle, which is the reconstructed particle with the largest transverse momentum$$ \left({p}_{\textrm{T}}^{\textrm{trig}}\right) $$ $\left(p_T^{\text{trig}}\right)$in the range 8<$$ {p}_{\textrm{T}}^{\textrm{trig}} $$ $p_T^{\text{trig}}$<15 GeV/c. The toward and away regions contain the primary and recoil jets, respectively; both regions are accompanied by the underlying event (UE). In contrast, the transverse region perpendicular to the direction of the trigger particle is dominated by the so-called UE dynamics, and includes also contributions from initial- and final-state radiation. The relative transverse activity classifier,$$ {R}_{\textrm{T}}={N}_{\textrm{ch}}^{\textrm{T}}/\left\langle {N}_{\textrm{ch}}^{\textrm{T}}\right\rangle $$ $R_T=N_{\mathrm{ch}}^T/\left(N_{\mathrm{ch}}^T\right)$, is used to group events according to their UE activity, where$$ {N}_{\textrm{ch}}^{\textrm{T}} $$ $N_{\mathrm{ch}}^T$is the charged-particle multiplicity per event in the transverse region and$$ \left\langle {N}_{\textrm{ch}}^{\textrm{T}}\right\rangle $$ $\left(N_{\mathrm{ch}}^T\right)$is the mean value over the whole analysed sample. The energy dependence of theR_Tdistributions in pp collisions at$$ \sqrt{s} $$ $\sqrt{s}$= 2.76, 5.02, 7, and 13 TeV is reported, exploring the Koba-Nielsen-Olesen (KNO) scaling properties of the multiplicity distributions. The first measurements of charged-particlep_Tspectra as a function ofR_Tin the three azimuthal regions in pp, p–Pb, and Pb–Pb collisions at$$ \sqrt{s_{\textrm{NN}}} $$ $\sqrt{s_{\mathrm{NN}}}$= 5.02 TeV are also reported. Data are compared with predictions obtained from the event generators PYTHIA 8 and EPOS LHC. This set of measurements is expected to contribute to the understanding of the origin of collective-like effects in small collision systems (pp and p–Pb). 

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4. Savior curvatons and large non-Gaussianity

   https://doi.org/10.1007/JHEP11(2023)218  

   Lodman, Jackie; Lu, Qianshu; Randall, Lisa (November 2023, Journal of High Energy Physics)

   A<sc>bstract</sc> Curvatons are light (compared to the Hubble scale during inflation) spectator fields during inflation that potentially contribute to adiabatic curvature perturbations post-inflation. They can alter CMB observables such as the spectral indexn_s, the tensor-to-scalar ratior, and the local non-Gaussianity$$ {f}_{\textrm{NL}}^{\left(\textrm{loc}\right)} $$ $f_{\mathrm{NL}}^{\left(\mathrm{loc}\right)}$. We systematically explore the observable space of a curvaton with a quadratic potential. We find that when the underlying inflation model does not satisfy then_sandrobservational constraints but can be made viable with a significant contribution from what we call a savior curvaton, a large$$ \left|{f}_{\textrm{NL}}^{\left(\textrm{loc}\right)}\right| $$ $\left(f_{\mathrm{NL}}^{\left(\mathrm{loc}\right)}\right)$>0.05, such that the model is distinguishable from single-field inflation, is inevitable. On the other hand, when the underlying inflation model already satisfies then_sandrobservational constraints, so significant curvaton contribution is forbidden, a large$$ \left|{f}_{\textrm{NL}}^{\left(\textrm{loc}\right)}\right| $$ $\left(f_{\mathrm{NL}}^{\left(\mathrm{loc}\right)}\right)$>0.05 is possible in the exceptional case when the isocurvature fluctuation in the curvaton fluid is much greater than the global curvature fluctuation. 

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5. When left and right disagree: entropy and von Neumann algebras in quantum gravity with general AlAdS boundary conditions

   https://doi.org/10.1007/JHEP08(2024)010  

   Marolf, Donald; Zhang, Daiming (August 2024, Journal of High Energy Physics)

   A<sc>bstract</sc> Euclidean path integrals for UV-completions ofd-dimensional bulk quantum gravity were recently studied in [1] by assuming that they satisfy axioms of finiteness, reality, continuity, reflection-positivity, and factorization. Sectors$$ {\mathcal{H}}_{\mathcal{B}} $$ $H_B$of the resulting Hilbert space were then defined for any (d− 2)-dimensional surface$$ \mathcal{B} $$ $B$, where$$ \mathcal{B} $$ $B$may be thought of as the boundary ∂Σ of a bulk Cauchy surface in a corresponding Lorentzian description, and where$$ \mathcal{B} $$ $B$includes the specification of appropriate boundary conditions for bulk fields. Cases where$$ \mathcal{B} $$ $B$was the disjoint unionB⊔Bof two identical (d− 2)-dimensional surfacesBwere studied in detail and, after the inclusion of finite-dimensional ‘hidden sectors,’ were shown to provide a Hilbert space interpretation of the associated Ryu-Takayanagi entropy. The analysis was performed by constructing type-I von Neumann algebras$$ {\mathcal{A}}_L^B $$ $A_L^B$,$$ {\mathcal{A}}_R^B $$ $A_R^B$that act respectively at the left and right copy ofBinB⊔B. Below, we consider the case of general$$ \mathcal{B} $$ $B$, and in particular for$$ \mathcal{B} $$ $B$=B_L⊔B_RwithB_L,B_Rdistinct. For anyB_R, we find that the von Neumann algebra atB_Lacting on the off-diagonal Hilbert space sector$$ {\mathcal{H}}_{B_L\bigsqcup {B}_R} $$ $H_{B_L\bigsqcup B_R}$is a central projection of the corresponding type-I von Neumann algebra on the ‘diagonal’ Hilbert space$$ {\mathcal{H}}_{B_L\bigsqcup {B}_L} $$ $H_{B_L\bigsqcup B_L}$. As a result, the von Neumann algebras$$ {\mathcal{A}}_L^{B_L} $$ $A_L^{B_L}$,$$ {\mathcal{A}}_R^{B_L} $$ $A_R^{B_L}$defined in [1] using the diagonal Hilbert space$$ {\mathcal{H}}_{B_L\bigsqcup {B}_L} $$ $H_{B_L\bigsqcup B_L}$turn out to coincide precisely with the analogous algebras defined using the full Hilbert space of the theory (including all sectors$$ {\mathcal{H}}_{\mathcal{B}} $$ $H_B$). A second implication is that, for any$$ {\mathcal{H}}_{B_L\bigsqcup {B}_R} $$ $H_{B_L\bigsqcup B_R}$, including the same hidden sectors as in the diagonal case again provides a Hilbert space interpretation of the Ryu-Takayanagi entropy. We also show the above central projections to satisfy consistency conditions that lead to a universal central algebra relevant to all choices ofB_LandB_R. 

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