Abstract
A measurement of the fiducial cross section for the electroweak production of two jets in association with a Z-boson, which includes the vector boson fusion process, is presented. The measurement is performed using 20.3 fb-1 of proton-proton collision data collected at a centre-of-mass energy of s=8 TeV by the ATLAS experiment at the Large Hadron Collider. The electroweak component is extracted by a fit to the dijet invariant mass distribution in a fiducial region chosen to enhance the electroweak contribution over the dominant background in which the jets are produced via the strong interaction. The electroweak cross section is in good agreement with the Standard Model expectations and the background-only hypothesis is rejected with significance above the 5σ level. In addition, measurements of cross sections and differential distributions for inclusive Z-boson-plus-dijet production are performed in five fiducial regions, each with different sensitivity to the electroweak contribution. The results are corrected for detector effects and compared to predictions from the Sherpa and Powheg event generators.
Highlights
The dominant production of a Z boson in association with two jets (Z j j) at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) occurs where the jets arise as a result of the strong interaction
A much rarer process occurs, where the jets arise as a result of the electroweak interaction
The vector boson fusion (VBF) diagram is of particular interest as it is very similar to the VBF production of a Higgs boson and to vector boson scattering diagrams
Summary
The dominant production of a Z boson in association with two jets (Z j j) at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) occurs where the jets arise as a result of the strong interaction (strong Z j j). Fiducial cross sections and distributions of inclusive Z j j production (including the strong and electroweak processes but dominated by the former). These measurements are performed in five fiducial regions with different sensitivity to the electroweak component. PT1 + pT2 + pTj1 + pTj2 , pT1 + pT2 + pTj1 + pTj2 where pTi is the transverse momentum vector of object i, and 1 and 2 label the two leptons that define the Z-boson candidate This ensures that the decay products of the Z boson and the two highest pT jets are well balanced, which further reduces events with additional radiation.
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