Higgs boson production at the LHC: Transverse-momentum resummation and rapidity dependence

Abstract

We consider Higgs boson production by gluon fusion in hadron collisions. We study the doubly-differential transverse-momentum ( q T ) and rapidity ( y ) distribution of the Higgs boson in perturbative QCD. In the region of small q T ( q T ≪ M H , M H being the mass of the Higgs boson), we include the effect of logarithmically-enhanced contributions due to multiparton radiation to all perturbative orders. We use the impact parameter and double Mellin moments to implement and factorize the multiparton kinematics constraint of transverse- and longitudinal-momentum conservation. The logarithmic terms are then systematically resummed in exponential form. At small q T , we perform the all-order resummation of large logarithms up to next-to-next-to-leading logarithmic accuracy, while at large q T ( q T ∼ M H ), we apply a matching procedure that recovers the fixed-order perturbation theory up to next-to-leading order. We present quantitative results for the differential cross section in q T and y at the LHC, and we comment on the comparison with the q T cross section integrated over y.