Search for a heavy gauge boson in the decay channel W'$\rightarrow$e$\nu$ with the ATLAS experiment

The standard model of particle physics is at the moment the best known model to describe the structure of matter. Nevertheless there are models that predict particles beyond the standard model, one of them, the sequential standard model, predicts a new heavy charged gauge boson called W', with almost the same quantities as the standard model W except higher masses. This thesis describes the search for such a hypothetical boson in the decay channel with an electron and a neutrino. The data used are recorded with the ATLAS experiment in 2012 with $\sqrt{s} = 8$ TeV and an integrated luminosity of about 20 fb$^{-1}$. In order to be sensitive to the signature of the hypothetical gauge boson different selection criteria are applied. The remaining background contribution of real electrons is estimated by Monte Carlo simulations. These simulations are done with partly different kinds of the detector simulation, therefore a comparison between these is done and differences are corrected. Background events where jets fake the electrons are estimated by a data driven method (matrix method). Different kinematic data distributions are compared with the estimated background and no differences according to new physics are found. Therefore a limit on the mass of the hypothetical W' boson is set. This is done with a bayesian approach and the expected and observed mass limit can be set to 2.97 TeV.