NNLO QCD corrections to the Higgs-strahlung processes at hadron colliders

Abstract

We implement, at next-to-next-to-leading order, the QCD corrections to Standard Model Higgs boson production in association with vector bosons at hadron colliders, qq̄→HV with V=W,Z. They consist of the two-loop corrections to the Drell–Yan process for the production of off-shell vector bosons, qq̄→V∗, and in the case of Z final states, of the additional contribution from heavy-quark loop mediated processes, in particular gg→HZ. For the Higgs boson masses relevant at the Tevatron and the LHC, MH≲200–300 GeV, the two-loop corrections are small, increasing the production cross sections by less than 5% and 10%, respectively; the scale dependence is reduced to a level of less than a few per cent. This places these processes among the most theoretically clean Higgs boson production channels at hadron colliders.