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Search for nonresonant pair production of Higgs bosons in the $b\bar{b}b\bar{b}$ final state in $pp$ collisions at $\sqrt{s}= 13$ TeV with the ATLAS detector

The ATLAS collaboration Aad, Georges ; Abbott, Braden Keim ; Abeling, Kira ; et al.
Phys.Rev.D 108 (2023) 052003, 2023.
Inspire Record 2621476 DOI 10.17182/hepdata.137769

A search for nonresonant Higgs boson pair production in the $b\bar{b}b\bar{b}$ final state is presented. The analysis uses 126 fb$^{-1}$ of $pp$ collision data at $\sqrt{s}={13}$ TeV collected with the ATLAS detector at the Large Hadron Collider, and targets both the gluon-gluon fusion and vector-boson fusion production modes. No evidence of the signal is found and the observed (expected) upper limit on the cross-section for nonresonant Higgs boson pair production is determined to be 5.4 (8.1) times the Standard Model predicted cross-section at 95% confidence level. Constraints are placed on modifiers to the $HHH$ and $HHVV$ couplings. The observed (expected) $2\sigma$ constraints on the $HHH$ coupling modifier, $\kappa_\lambda$, are determined to be $[-3.5, 11.3]$ ($[-5.4, 11.4]$), while the corresponding constraints for the $HHVV$ coupling modifier, $\kappa_{2V}$, are $[-0.0, 2.1]$ ($[-0.1, 2.1]$). In addition, constraints on relevant coefficients are derived in the context of the Standard Model effective field theory and Higgs effective field theory, and upper limits on the $HH$ production cross-section are placed in seven Higgs effective field theory benchmark scenarios.

38 data tables

Distributions of the reconstructed m<sub>HH</sub> in data (shown by the black points), the estimated background (shown by the yellow histograms) in the VBF signal region with |&Delta;&eta;<sub>HH</sub>| &lt; 1.5. The hatching shows the total uncertainty of the background estimate. The distribution of the expected background is obtained using the best-fit values of the nuisance parameters in the fit to the data with the background-only hypothesis. Distributions for three choices of couplings are shown: the SM, &kappa;<sub>&lambda;</sub>= 6, and &kappa;<sub>2V</sub> = 0 (with all other couplings set to their SM values in the last two models), scaled so as to be visible on the plot. The lower panels show the ratio of the observed data yield to the predicted background in each bin. Events in the overflow bins are counted in the yields of the final bins. In the HEPData entry, the raw value per histogram bin is provided, while in the published paper the values in the histogram are scaled by the bin width.

Distributions of the reconstructed m<sub>HH</sub> in data (shown by the black points), the estimated background (shown by the yellow histograms) in the VBF signal region with |&Delta;&eta;<sub>HH</sub>| &gt; 1.5. The hatching shows the total uncertainty of the background estimate. The distribution of the expected background is obtained using the best-fit values of the nuisance parameters in the fit to the data with the background-only hypothesis. Distributions for three choices of couplings are shown: the SM, &kappa;<sub>&lambda;</sub>= 6, and &kappa;<sub>2V</sub> = 0 (with all other couplings set to their SM values in the last two models), scaled so as to be visible on the plot. The lower panels show the ratio of the observed data yield to the predicted background in each bin. Events in the overflow bins are counted in the yields of the final bins. In the HEPData entry, the raw value per histogram bin is provided, while in the published paper the values in the histogram are scaled by the bin width.

The observed 95&#37; CL exclusion limits as a function of &kappa;<sub>&lambda;</sub> (obtained using the signal strength &mu;<sub>ggF+VBF</sub> as the POI) from the combined ggF and VBF signal regions, as shown by the solid black line. The value of &kappa;<sub>2V</sub> is fixed to 1. The blue and yellow bands show respectively the 1&sigma; and 2&sigma; bands around the expected exclusion limits, which are shown by the dashed black line. The expected exclusion limits are obtained using a fit to the data with the background-only hypothesis. The dark red line shows the predicted combined ggF and VBF HH cross-section as a function of &kappa;<sub>&lambda;</sub>.

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