Z boson cross section measurement using CMS at the LHC

The cross section of pp -> Z -> e+e− was measured for sqrt(s) = 7 TeV pp collisions at the Large Hadron Collider using the Compact Muon Solenoid detector. Well-reconstructed electrons within the region |eta| < 1.4442, 1.566 < |eta| < 2.5 and with a transverse energy of at least 25 GeV were used, with an invariant mass window of 60 to 120 GeV. In 36.1 pb-1 of data, 8453 candidate events were found. The cross section was measured to be 990 ± 48 pb, which agrees well with the NNLO prediction of 972 pb.