The production of a W boson in association with a single charm quark is studied using 4.6 fb^-1 of pp collision data at sqrt(s)=7 TeV collected with the ATLAS detector at the Large Hadron Collider. In events in which a W boson decays to an electron or muon, the charm quark is tagged either by its semileptonic decay to a muon or by the presence of a charmed meson. The integrated and differential cross sections as a function of the pseudorapidity of the lepton from the W-boson decay are measured. Results are compared to the predictions of next-to-leading-order QCD calculations obtained from various parton distribution function parameterisations. The ratio of the strange-to-down sea-quark distributions is determined to be 0.96 +0.26 -0.30 at Q^2=1.9 GeV^2, which supports the hypothesis of an SU(3)-symmetric composition of the light-quark sea. Additionally, the cross-section ratio sigma(W^+ + bar{c})/sigma(W^- + c) is compared to the predictions obtained using parton distribution function parameterisations with different assumptions about the s-bar{s} quark asymmetry.
Measured integrated cross sections of the production of a W boson with a single c-jet, a D meson or a D* meson times the branching ratio W -> l nu in the fiducial regions together with the statistical and systematic uncertainties. For the W+c-jet cross sections events with more than one c-jet are discarded. The particle-level c-jet is defined as the one containing a weakly decaying c-hadron with pt>5 GeV, within DeltaR<0.3. Jets containing c-hadrons originating from b-hadron decays are not counted as c-jets. Jets are not required for the W+D/D* cross sections. The cross sections are defined for OS-SS events.
Measured integrated cross section ratios of the production of W+ and W- bosons associated with a single c-jet, a D meson or a D* meson in the fiducial regions together with the statistical and systematic uncertainties. For the W+c-jet cross sections events with more than one c-jet are discarded. The particle-level c-jet is defined as the one containing a weakly decaying c-hadron with pt>5 GeV, within DeltaR<0.3. Jets containing c-hadrons originating from b-hadron decays are not counted as c-jets. Jets are not required for the W+D/D* cross sections. The cross sections are defined for OS-SS events.
Measured differential cross sections as function of the lepton pseudo-rapidity of the production of a W boson with a single c-jet times the branching ratio W -> l nu in the fiducial regions together with the statistical and systematic uncertainties. For the W+c-jet cross sections events with more than one c-jet are discarded. The particle-level c-jet is defined as the one containing a weakly decaying c-hadron with pt>5 GeV, within DeltaR<0.3. Jets containing c-hadrons originating from b-hadron decays are not counted as c-jets. The cross sections are defined for OS-SS events.
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