NLO QCD + EW corrections to ZZZ production with subsequent leptonic decays at the LHC

Abstract

In this paper we present the NLO QCD + NLO EW corrections to the ZZZ production with subsequent Z-boson leptonic decays at the LHC by adopting the improved narrow width approximation, which takes into account off-shell contributions and spin correlations. Integrated cross sections at 13, 14, 33 and hadron colliders and various kinematic distributions are presented. Our numerical results show that the jet emission correction accounts for a large part of the total QCD correction, especially in the high energy region. By applying a proper cut to the jet transverse momentum, e.g., , the jet emission correction can be reduced and the cross section is less dependent on the factorization/renormalization scale. This work reveals that both the NLO QCD and the NLO EW corrections are significant. For example, the NLO QCD, NLO EW and NLO QCD + EW relative corrections in the inclusive event selection scheme at the LHC can reach , and , respectively, which means that neither the NLO QCD nor the NLO EW correction is negligible in precision calculations.