Abstract
A search for Higgs boson invisible decay modes has been carried out in events where the Higgs boson is produced in association with a Z boson as well as through vector boson fusion. In the associated production search, electron, muon and b-quark pair decay modes of the Z boson are considered. The analyses are based on pp collision data collected with the CMS detector at the LHC collider at centre-of-mass energies of 7 and 8 TeV, corresponding to integrated luminosities of 5 fb−1 and 20 fb−1, respectively. No evidence of a signal has been found and upper limits on the invisible branching fraction are obtained and interpreted in a Higgs portal model of dark matter interactions.
Highlights
A search for Higgs boson invisible decay modes has been carried out in events where the Higgs boson is produced in association with a Z boson as well as through vector boson fusion
Decays of the Higgs boson to undetectable particles are possible in a wide range of models
Higgs boson is produced in association with two quarks, and the ZH mode, where the Z boson decays to leptons (Z( )H(inv) channel) or a bbquark pair (Z(bb)H(inv) channel)
Summary
Limits are calculated using a CLS method [13, 14], where systematic uncertainties are incorporated as nuisance parameters. The observed (expected) limits on ξ for a Higgs boson of mass 125 GeV set by the three individual searches are 0.65 (0.49), 0.83 (0.86), and 1.82 (1.99) in the VBF, Z( )H(inv), and Z(bb)H(inv) channels, respectively. By assuming production cross sections as for the SM Higgs boson, these individual results may be combined and interpreted as a limit on the invisible branching fraction of the 125 GeV Higgs boson. The statistical combination fully accounts for correlations between nuisance parameters in the individual searches, such as the unσ x B(H→ inv)/σ.
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