A search for heavy Higgs bosons produced in association with a vector boson and decaying into a pair of vector bosons is performed in final states with two leptons (electrons or muons) of the same electric charge, missing transverse momentum and jets. A data sample of proton-proton collisions at a centre-of-mass energy of 13 TeV recorded with the ATLAS detector at the Large Hadron Collider between 2015 and 2018 is used. The data correspond to a total integrated luminosity of 139 fb$^{-1}$. The observed data are in agreement with Standard Model background expectations. The results are interpreted using higher-dimensional operators in an effective field theory. Upper limits on the production cross-section are calculated at 95% confidence level as a function of the heavy Higgs boson's mass and coupling strengths to vector bosons. Limits are set in the Higgs boson mass range from 300 to 1500 GeV, and depend on the assumed couplings. The highest excluded mass for a heavy Higgs boson with the coupling combinations explored is 900 GeV. Limits on coupling strengths are also provided.
This paper presents a search for a new Z' vector gauge boson with the ATLAS experiment at the Large Hadron Collider using pp collision data collected at $\sqrt{s} = 13$ TeV, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 139 fb$^{-1}$. The new gauge boson Z' is predicted by $L_{\mu}-L_{\tau}$ models to address observed phenomena that can not be explained by the Standard Model. The search examines the four-muon (4$\mu$) final state, using a deep learning neural network classifier to separate the Z' signal from the Standard Model background events. The di-muon invariant masses in the $4\mu$ events are used to extract the Z' resonance signature. No significant excess of events is observed over the predicted background. Upper limits at a 95% confidence level on the Z' production cross-section times the decay branching fraction of $pp \rightarrow Z'\mu\mu \rightarrow 4\mu$ are set from 0.31 to 4.3 fb for the Z' mass ranging from 5 to 81 GeV. The corresponding common coupling strengths, $g_{Z'}$, of the Z' boson to the second and third generation leptons above 0.003 - 0.2 have been excluded.
This paper presents a search for exotic decays of the Higgs boson into a pair of new pseudoscalar particles, $H\rightarrow aa$, where one pseudoscalar decays into a $b$-quark pair and the other decays into a $\tau$-lepton pair, in the mass range $12\leq m_{a}\leq 60$ GeV. The analysis uses $pp$ collision data at $\sqrt{s} = 13$ TeV collected with the ATLAS detector at the LHC, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 140 ${fb}^{-1}$. No significant excess above the Standard Model (SM) prediction is observed. Assuming the SM Higgs boson production cross-section, the search sets upper limits at 95% confidence level on the branching ratio of Higgs bosons decaying into $b\bar{b}\tau^+\tau^-$, $\mathcal{B}(H \rightarrow aa \rightarrow b\bar{b}\tau^+\tau^-)$, between 2.2% and 3.9% depending on the pseudoscalar mass.
Differential cross-sections are measured for the production of four charged leptons in association with two jets. These measurements are sensitive to final states in which the jets are produced via the strong interaction as well as to the purely-electroweak vector boson scattering process. The analysis is performed using proton-proton collision data collected by ATLAS at $\sqrt{s}=13$ TeV and with an integrated luminosity of 140 fb$^{-1}$. The data are corrected for the effects of detector inefficiency and resolution and are compared to state-of-the-art Monte Carlo event generator predictions. The differential cross-sections are used to search for anomalous weak-boson self-interactions that are induced by dimension-six and dimension-eight operators in Standard Model effective field theory.
Inclusive and differential measurements of the top-antitop ($t\bar{t}$) charge asymmetry $A_\text{C}^{t\bar{t}}$ and the leptonic asymmetry $A_\text{C}^{\ell\bar{\ell}}$ are presented in proton-proton collisions at $\sqrt{s} = 13$ TeV recorded by the ATLAS experiment at the CERN Large Hadron Collider. The measurement uses the complete Run 2 dataset, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 139 fb$^{-1}$, combines data in the single-lepton and dilepton channels, and employs reconstruction techniques adapted to both the resolved and boosted topologies. A Bayesian unfolding procedure is performed to correct for detector resolution and acceptance effects. The combined inclusive $t\bar{t}$ charge asymmetry is measured to be $A_\text{C}^{t\bar{t}} = 0.0068 \pm 0.0015$, which differs from zero by 4.7 standard deviations. Differential measurements are performed as a function of the invariant mass, transverse momentum and longitudinal boost of the $t\bar{t}$ system. Both the inclusive and differential measurements are found to be compatible with the Standard Model predictions, at next-to-next-to-leading order in quantum chromodynamics perturbation theory with next-to-leading-order electroweak corrections. The measurements are interpreted in the framework of the Standard Model effective field theory, placing competitive bounds on several Wilson coefficients.
A search for low-mass dilepton resonances in Higgs boson decays is conducted in the four-lepton final state. The decay is assumed to proceed via a pair of beyond the standard model particles, or one such particle and a Z boson. The search uses proton-proton collision data collected with the CMS detector at the CERN LHC, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 137 fb$^{-1}$, at a center-of-mass energy $\sqrt{s} =$ 13 TeV. No significant deviation from the standard model expectation is observed. Upper limits at 95% confidence level are set on model-independent Higgs boson decay branching fractions. Additionally, limits on dark photon and axion-like particle production, based on two specific models, are reported.
We report on the measurement of the $\gamma p \rightarrow J/\psi p$ cross section from $E_\gamma = 11.8$ GeV down to the threshold at $8.2$ GeV using a tagged photon beam with the GlueX experiment. We find the total cross section falls toward the threshold less steeply than expected from two-gluon exchange models. The differential cross section $d\sigma /dt$ has an exponential slope of $1.67 \pm 0.39$ GeV$^{-2}$ at $10.7$ GeV average energy. The LHCb pentaquark candidates $P_c^+$ can be produced in the $s$-channel of this reaction. We see no evidence for them and set model-dependent upper limits on their branching fractions $\mathcal{B}(P_c^+ \rightarrow J/\psi p)$ and cross sections $\sigma(\gamma p \to P_c^+)\times\mathcal{B}(P_c^+ \to J/\psi p) $.
Results are presented on a search for CP violation in the production and decay of top quark-antiquark pairs in the lepton+jets channel. The search is based on data from proton-proton collisions at 13 TeV, collected with the CMS detector, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 138 fb$^{-1}$. Possible CP violation effects are evaluated by measuring uncorrected asymmetries in observables constructed from linearly independent four-momentum vectors of the final-state particles. The dimensionless chromoelectric dipole moment of the top quark obtained from the observed asymmetries is measured to be 0.04 $\pm$ 0.10 (stat) $\pm$ 0.07 (syst), and the asymmetries exhibit no evidence for CP-violating effects, consistent with expectations from the standard model.
The mass of the top quark is measured in 36.3 fb$^{-1}$ of LHC proton-proton collision data collected with the CMS detector at $\sqrt{s}$ = 13 TeV. The measurement uses a sample of top quark pair candidate events containing one isolated electron or muon and at least four jets in the final state. For each event, the mass is reconstructed from a kinematic fit of the decay products to a top quark pair hypothesis. A profile likelihood method is applied using up to four observables to extract the top quark mass. The top quark mass is measured to be 171.77 $\pm$ 0.37 GeV. This approach significantly improves the precision over previous measurements.
Measurements of Higgs boson production, where the Higgs boson decays into a pair of $\tau$ leptons, are presented, using a sample of proton-proton collisions collected with the CMS experiment at a center-of-mass energy of 13 TeV, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 138 fb$^{-1}$. Three analyses are presented. Two are targeting Higgs boson production via gluon fusion and vector boson fusion: a neural network based analysis and an analysis based on an event categorization optimized on the ratio of signal over background events. These are complemented by an analysis targeting vector boson associated Higgs boson production. Results are presented in the form of signal strengths relative to the standard model predictions and products of cross sections and branching fraction to $\tau$ leptons, in up to 16 different kinematic regions. For the simultaneous measurements of the neural network based analysis and the analysis targeting vector boson associated Higgs boson production signal strengths are found to be 0.82 $\pm$ 0.11 for inclusive Higgs boson production, 0.67 $\pm$ 0.19 (0.81 $\pm$ 0.17) for the production mainly via gluon fusion (vector boson fusion), and 1.79 $\pm$ 0.45 for vector boson associated Higgs boson production.