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Discovery and measurement of the Higgs boson in the WW decay channel

In the Standard Model of particle physics, the non-zero masses of the $W$ and $Z$ bosons and the fermions are generated through interactions with the Higgs field, excitations of which correspond to Higgs bosons. Thus, the experimental discovery of the Higgs boson is of prime importance to physics, a...

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Autor principal: Hall, David
Lenguaje:eng
Publicado: Oxford U. 2014
Materias:
Acceso en línea:http://cds.cern.ch/record/1950648
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author Hall, David
author_facet Hall, David
author_sort Hall, David
collection CERN
description In the Standard Model of particle physics, the non-zero masses of the $W$ and $Z$ bosons and the fermions are generated through interactions with the Higgs field, excitations of which correspond to Higgs bosons. Thus, the experimental discovery of the Higgs boson is of prime importance to physics, and would confirm our understanding of fundamental mass generation. This thesis describes a search for the $gg \to H \to WW \to \ell\nu\ell\nu$ process of Higgs boson production and decay. It uses the LHC Run I dataset of $pp$ collisions recorded by the ATLAS detector, which corresponds to an integrated luminosity of $4.5~\text{fb}^{-1}$ at $\sqrt{s} = 7~\text{TeV}$ and $20.3~\text{fb}^{-1}$ at $\sqrt{s} = 8~\text{TeV}$. An excess of events is observed with a significance of 4.8 standard deviations, which is consistent with Higgs boson production. The significance is extended to 6.1 standard deviations when the vector boson fusion production process is included. The measured signal strength is $1.11^{+0.23}_{-0.21}$ at $m_{\text{H}} = 125~\text{GeV}$. A cross section measurement of $WW$ production, a major background to this search, is also presented using the $\sqrt{s} = 7~\text{TeV}$ dataset only.
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spelling cern-19506482019-09-30T06:29:59Zhttp://cds.cern.ch/record/1950648engHall, DavidDiscovery and measurement of the Higgs boson in the WW decay channelParticle Physics - ExperimentIn the Standard Model of particle physics, the non-zero masses of the $W$ and $Z$ bosons and the fermions are generated through interactions with the Higgs field, excitations of which correspond to Higgs bosons. Thus, the experimental discovery of the Higgs boson is of prime importance to physics, and would confirm our understanding of fundamental mass generation. This thesis describes a search for the $gg \to H \to WW \to \ell\nu\ell\nu$ process of Higgs boson production and decay. It uses the LHC Run I dataset of $pp$ collisions recorded by the ATLAS detector, which corresponds to an integrated luminosity of $4.5~\text{fb}^{-1}$ at $\sqrt{s} = 7~\text{TeV}$ and $20.3~\text{fb}^{-1}$ at $\sqrt{s} = 8~\text{TeV}$. An excess of events is observed with a significance of 4.8 standard deviations, which is consistent with Higgs boson production. The significance is extended to 6.1 standard deviations when the vector boson fusion production process is included. The measured signal strength is $1.11^{+0.23}_{-0.21}$ at $m_{\text{H}} = 125~\text{GeV}$. A cross section measurement of $WW$ production, a major background to this search, is also presented using the $\sqrt{s} = 7~\text{TeV}$ dataset only.Oxford U.CERN-THESIS-2014-130oai:cds.cern.ch:19506482014-08-27
spellingShingle Particle Physics - Experiment
Hall, David
Discovery and measurement of the Higgs boson in the WW decay channel
title Discovery and measurement of the Higgs boson in the WW decay channel
title_full Discovery and measurement of the Higgs boson in the WW decay channel
title_fullStr Discovery and measurement of the Higgs boson in the WW decay channel
title_full_unstemmed Discovery and measurement of the Higgs boson in the WW decay channel
title_short Discovery and measurement of the Higgs boson in the WW decay channel
title_sort discovery and measurement of the higgs boson in the ww decay channel
topic Particle Physics - Experiment
url http://cds.cern.ch/record/1950648
work_keys_str_mv AT halldavid discoveryandmeasurementofthehiggsbosoninthewwdecaychannel