skip to main content
OSTI.GOV title logo U.S. Department of Energy
Office of Scientific and Technical Information

Title: Search for the Higgs boson produced in association with a W boson at CDF Run II

Thesis/Dissertation ·
DOI:https://doi.org/10.2172/946540· OSTI ID:946540
 [1]
  1. The Ohio State Univ., Columbus, OH (United States)

We present a search for standard model Higgs boson production in association with a W boson in proton-antiproton collisions (p$$\bar{p}$$ → W±H → ℓνb$$\bar{b}$$) at a center of mass energy of 1.96 TeV. WH candidate events have a signature of a single lepton (E±±), missing transverse energy, and two jets. The search looks for candidate events in approximately 2.7 fb-1 of data recorded with the CDF II detector. The high-pT lepton (e,μ) in the events provides a distinct signature for triggering and most of the events in the dataset come from high-p{sub t} lepton triggers. Our analysis improves on prior searches by including events recorded on the ET + 2 Jets trigger with a lepton reconstructed as an isolated high-pT charged particle. We increase the sample purity by identifying ('tagging') long-lived b-hadrons in jets. A neural network combines distinguishing kinematic information into a function optimized for WH sensitivity. The neural network output distributions are consistent with the standard model background expectations and we set limits upper limits on the rate of Higgs production. We set 95% confidence level upper limits on the WH production cross section times branching ratio for Higgs masses from 100 to 150 GeV/c2 and express our results as a ratio of the experimental limit to the theoretical Standard Model production rate. Our limits range from 3.6 (4.3 expected) to 61.1 (43.2 expected) for Higgs masses from 100 to 150 GeV/c2 , respectively.

Research Organization:
Fermi National Accelerator Lab. (FNAL), Batavia, IL (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE
DOE Contract Number:
AC02-07CH11359
OSTI ID:
946540
Report Number(s):
FERMILAB-THESIS-2009-01; TRN: US0900972
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English