We explore for the first time the possibilities to measure an intermediate-mass (mH = 115-140 GeV/c^2) Standard-Model Higgs boson in electromagnetic proton-lead (pPb) interactions at the CERN Large Hadron Collider (LHC) via its b-bbar decay. Using equivalent Weizsaecker-Williams photon fluxes and Higgs effective field theory for the coupling gamma-gamma --> H, we obtain a leading-order cross section of the order of 0.3 pb for exclusive Higgs production in elastic (pPb --> gamma-gamma --> p H Pb) and semielastic (pPb --> gamma-gamma --> Pb H X) processes at sqrt(s) = 8.8 TeV. After applying various kinematics cuts to remove the main backgrounds (gamma-gamma --> b-bbar and misidentified gamma-gamma-->q-qbar events), we find that a Higgs boson with mH = 120 GeV/c^2 could be observed in the b-bbar channel with a 3sigma-significance integrating 300 pb^-1 with an upgraded pA luminosity of 10^31 cm^-2s^-1. We also provide for the first time semielastic Higgs cross sections, along with elastic t-tbar cross sections, for electromagnetic pp, pA and AA collisions at the LHC.
We present a study of the Higgs production at the LHC via Weak Boson Fusion, with the Higgs boson decaying into a b-quark pair. A detailed partonic LO calculation of all the potential backgrounds is performed. We conclude that this channel for Higgs production can be extracted from the backgrounds, and present our estimates of the accuracy in the determination of the Hbb Yukawa coupling.
Central exclusive Higgs boson production, pp -> p + H + p, at the LHC and s-channel resonant Higgs production in the photon-collider option of the ILC can provide a very important contribution to the comprehensive study of the Higgs sector. Especially attractive is the b bbar Higgs decay mode, which for certain MSSM scenarios may become the discovery channel in exclusive Higgs production at the LHC and the Photon Collider (PC). Strongly suppressed and controllable backgrounds is an obvious requirement for the success of these exclusive measurements. One of the main sources of background comes …
We investigate the potential to observe double parton scattering at the Large Hadron Collider in p p -> W b bbar X -> l nu b bbar X at 7 TeV. Our analysis tests the efficacy of several kinematic variables in isolating the double parton process of interest from the single parton process and relevant backgrounds for the first 10 inverse fb of integrated luminosity. These variables are constructed to expose the independent nature of the two subprocesses in double parton scattering, pp -> l nu X and pp -> b bbar X. We use next-to-leading order perturbative predictions for the double parton and sin…
New quark singlets T can be produced in pairs at LHC through standard QCD interactions, with a large cross section for masses of several hundreds of GeV. Their charged current decays T Tbar T -> W+ b W- bbar, with semileptonic decay of the W pair, give a final state l nu bb jj$, as in top pair production. The mixed decay modes T Tbar -> W+ b H tbar, H t W- bbar -> W+ b W- bbar H, T Tbar -> W+ b Z tbar, Z t W- bbar -> W+ b W- bbar Z, with H,Z -> jj, yield two more jets, l nu bb jjjj, or the same state in the latter case for Z -> nu nubar. We extend previous work examining in detail the extra H …
Strangeness and multi-strangeness particles production can be used to explore the initial transient field fluctuations in heavy ion collisions. We emphasize the role played by Junction anti-Junction (JJbar) loops and strong color electric fields (SCF) in these collisions. Transient field fluctuations of SCF on the baryon production in central (0-5%) Pb+Pb collisions at nucleon-nucleon centre of mass energy of 5.5 TeV will be discussed in the framework of HIJING/BBbar v2.0 model, looking in particular to the predicted evolution of nuclear modification factors R_AA from RHIC to LHC energies. Our…
I present NNNLO collinear and soft gluon corrections for Higgs production via the process b bbar -> H. I show that the collinear corrections dominate and contribute large enhancements to the cross section at both the Tevatron and the LHC.
We study the discovery reach of the Tevatron and the LHC for detecting a Higgs boson (h), predicted in composite models of the electroweak symmetry breaking or in supersymmetric theories, with an enhanced b-quark Yukawa coupling via p \bar{p} / p p \to b \bbar h (\to b \bbar) + X. Our analysis shows that studying this process at the Tevatron Run II or the LHC can provide strong constraints on these models.
Single and pair top-quark production in proton-lead (p-Pb) and lead-lead (Pb-Pb) collisions at the CERN Large Hadron Collider (LHC) and future circular collider (FCC) energies, are studied with next-to-leading-order perturbative QCD calculations including nuclear parton distribution functions. At the LHC, the pair-production cross sections amount to sigma(t-tbar) = 3.4 mub in Pb-Pb at sqrt(s) = 5.5 TeV, and sigma(t-tbar) = 60 nb in p-Pb at sqrt(s) = 8.8 TeV. At the FCC energies of sqrt(s) = 39 and 63 TeV, the same cross sections are factors of 90 and 55 times larger respectively. In the lepton…
We present the differential rates for exclusive $\Bbar\to X \ell_1 \ell_2$, where $\ell_1$ is a charged massless lepton and $\ell_2$ is a charged or neutral massless lepton, and $X$ is a mesonic system up to spin 2. The cases of interest are semileptonic (SL) $\Bbar\to \xcu\ellm \barnuell$ decays, and $\Bbar \to X_s \ellm \ellp$ where the the di-lepton can be $c \bar{c}$ resonances or non-resonant electroweak penguins (EWP). We consider helicity amplitudes having non-zero relative phases that can be potential new sources for CP-violation. Our motivations for these additional phases include a c…
Simple generic expressions to compute double-parton scattering (DPS) cross sections in high-energy proton-nucleus and nucleus-nucleus collisions, as a function of the corresponding single-parton cross sections, are presented. Estimates of DPS contributions are studied for two specific processes at LHC energies: (i) same-sign W-boson pair production in p-Pb, and (ii) double-J/psi production in Pb-Pb, using NLO predictions with nuclear parton densities for the corresponding single-parton cross sections. The expected DPS cross sections and event rates after typical acceptance and efficiency losse…
We present an implementation of the next-to-leading order hadronic production of a W boson in association with a pair of massive bottom quarks in the framework of POWHEG, a method to consistently interface NLO QCD calculations with shower Monte Carlo generators. The process has been implemented using the POWHEG BOX, an automated computer code that sistematically applies the POWHEG method to NLO QCD calculations. Spin correlations in the decay of the W boson into leptons have been taken into account using standard approximated techniques. We present phenomenological results for W b bbar-> l nu …
We study in this paper the production, in hadronic collisions, of final states with W gauge bosons, heavy quark pairs and n extra jets (with n up to 4). The complete partonic tree-level QCD matrix elements are evaluated using the ALPHA algorithm, and the events generated at the parton level are then evolved through the QCD shower and eventually hadronised using the coherent shower evolution provided by the HERWIG Monte Carlo. We discuss the details of our Monte Carlo implementation, and present results of phenomenological interest for the Tevatron Collider and for the LHC. We also comment on t…
We present recent results for heavy-flavor observables in nucleus-nucleus collisions at LHC energies, obtained with the POWLANG transport setup. The initial creation of c-cbar and b-bbar pairs is simulated with a perturbative QCD approach (POWHEG+PYTHIA); their propagation in the medium (created in the nucleus-nucleus or in proton-nucleus collision) is studied with the relativistic Langevin equation, here solved using weak-coupling transport coefficients. Successively, the heavy quarks hadronize in the medium. We compute the nuclear modification factor and the elliptic flow parameter of the fi…
We investigate single top production in the presence of anomalous Wtb couplings. We explicitly show that, if these couplings arise from gauge invariant effective operators, the only relevant couplings for single top production and decay are the usual gamma^mu and sigma^mu nu q_nu terms, where q is the W boson momentum. This happens even in the single top production processes where the Wtb interaction involves off-shell top and/or bottom quarks. With this parameterisation for the Wtb vertex, we obtain expressions for the dependence on anomalous couplings of the single top cross sections, for (i…
We present the most general (six-helicity) angular analysis of Bs -> V_1 (-> P_1P'_1) V_2 (-> P_2P'_2) (V_i is a vector meson, and P_i, P'_i are pseudoscalars). We focus on final states accessible to both Bs and Bsbar -- these are mainly bbar -> sbar penguin decays. We also derive the most general decay amplitude, and discuss the differences between it and that used by LHCb in its analysis of Bs -> phi phi. In the standard model, all CP violation is predicted to be small, so that the simple measurement of a sizeable CP-violating observable indicates the presence of new physics. A full fit to t…
Results from a realistic simulation of the heavy MSSM Higgs-bosons A and H production, gamma gamma -> A,H -> b bbar, at the Photon Collider at TESLA are reported. In the scenario where a light SM-like Higgs boson h exists, we study (following M. Muehlleitner et al.) Higgs bosons A and H for masses M_A=200,250,300,350 GeV and tan(beta)=7. This scenario corresponds to parameters region not accessible at LHC or at the first stage of the e^+ e^- collider. NLO estimation of background, analysis of overlaying events, realistic b-tagging and corrections for escaping neutrinos were performed. The stat…
Heavy nuclei at collider energies are a source of high energy Weizsaecker-Williams photons. This photon flux may be utilized to study high energy photon-nucleus interactions. Here we concentrate on the coherent diffractive production of heavy vector mesons on nuclear targets and show how it probes the unintegrated glue of the nucleus in the saturation domain. We present predictions for rapidity distributions of exclusive coherent J/Psi and Upsilon mesons which can be measured by the ALICE experiment at the LHC.
Proton-nucleus (p+A) collisions have long been recognized as a crucial component of the physics programme with nuclear beams at high energies, in particular for their reference role to interpret and understand nucleus-nucleus data as well as for their potential to elucidate the partonic structure of matter at low parton fractional momenta (small-x). Here, we summarize the main motivations that make a proton-nucleus run a decisive ingredient for a successful heavy-ion programme at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) and we present unique scientific opportunities arising from these collisions. We al…
The forthcoming LHC measurement of hadron multiplicity in proton-nucleus collisions is a crucial test of the k_t factorization and gluon saturation based models. Here, we provide quantitative predictions for the pseudorapidity distribution of charged particles produced in minimum bias proton-nucleus collisions at the LHC based on the idea of gluon saturation in the color-glass condensate framework. Our formulation gives good descriptions of the LHC and RHIC data for the charged-hadron multiplicities in both proton-proton and nucleus-nucleus collisions, and also the deep inelastic scattering at…
We have compiled the experimentally measured pbar/p ratio at midrapidity in p+p collisions from \sqrt{s} = 23 to 7000 GeV and compared it to various mechanisms of baryon production as implemented in PYTHIA, PHOJET and HIJING/B-Bbar models. For the models studied with default settings, PHOJET has the best agreement with the measurements, PYTHIA gives a higher value for \sqrt{s} < 200 GeV and the ratios from HIJING/B-Bbar are consistently lower for all the \sqrt{s} studied. Comparison of the data to different mechanisms of baryon production as implemented in PYTHIA shows that through a suitable …
We summarize measurements of b and c jet production at the LHC, which are an important signature and background for decays of massive particles such as H-to-b-bbar. These include measurements of the inclusive and dijet production of heavy quark jets, b and c jets produced in association with vector bosons Z and W, and decays of boosted Z bosons into pairs of b-bbar. The current status of b tagging and b jet energy scale is also reviewed. These measurements test perturbative QCD in the four and five-flavor number schemes, and provide insight into the relative importance of heavy flavor producti…
A sizable rate of events, with several pairs of heavy-quarks produced contemporarily by multiple parton interactions, may be expected at very high energies as a consequence of the large parton luminosities. The production rates are enhanced in hadron-nucleus reactions, which may represent a convenient tool to study the phenomenon. We compare the different contributions to ccbar bbar pairs production due to single and double parton scatterings, in collisions of protons with nuclei at the CERN-LHC.
In the Standard Model, the coupling of the Higgs boson to b quarks is weak, leading to small cross sections for producing a Higgs boson in association with b quarks. However, Higgs bosons with enhanced couplings to b quarks, such as occur in supersymmetric models for large values of tan beta, will be copiously produced at both the Tevatron and the LHC in association with b quarks, which will be an important discovery channel. We investigate the connections between the production channels, bg -> bh and gg ->b bbar h, at next-to-leading order (NLO) in perturbative QCD and present results for the…
We obtain constraints on the mixing of vector-like quarks coupling predominantly to the third generation. We consider all (seven) relevant types of vector-like quarks, individually. The constraints are derived from oblique corrections and Z -> b bbar measurements at LEP and SLC. We investigate the implications of these constraints on LHC phenomenology, concerning the decays of the heavy quarks and their single production. We also explore indirect effects of heavy quark mixing in top and bottom couplings. A remarkable effect is the possibility of explaining the anomalous forward-backward asymme…
We introduce a global analysis of collinearly factorized nuclear parton distribution functions (PDFs) including, for the first time, data constraints from LHC proton-lead collisions. In comparison to our previous analysis, EPS09, where data only from charged-lepton-nucleus deep inelastic scattering (DIS), Drell-Yan (DY) dilepton production in proton-nucleus collisions and inclusive pion production in deuteron-nucleus collisions were the input, we now increase the variety of data constraints to cover also neutrino-nucleus DIS and low-mass DY production in pion-nucleus collisions. The new LHC da…
Higgs boson production in association with two forward jets and a central photon at the CERN Large Hadron Collider is analyzed, for the Higgs boson decaying into a b bbar pair in the m_H <= 140 GeV mass region. We study both irreducible and main reducible backgrounds at parton level. Compared to the Higgs production via vector-boson fusion, the request of a further photon at moderate rapidities dramatically enhances the signal/background ratio. Inclusive cross sections for p_T^γ>= 20 GeV can reach a few tens of fb's. After a suitable choice of kinematical cuts, the cross-section ratio for sign…
The small mass of the bottom quark, relative to its weak isospin partner, the top quark, makes the bottom an effective probe of new physics in Higgs and top sectors. We study the Higgs boson production associated with bottom quarks, ppbar/pp to phi+b+bbar to 4b, at the Fermilab Tevatron and the CERN LHC. We find that strong and model-independent constraints on the size of the phi-b-bbar coupling can be obtained for a wide range of Higgs boson masses. Their implications for the composite Higgs models with strong dynamics associated with the third family quarks (such as the top-condensate/topcol…
We obtain prompt di-photon cross-section in proton-nucleus collisions in Hamiltonian light-cone approach within a hybrid approximation, treating the projectile proton in the parton model and the target nucleus in the Color-Glass-Condensate approach. We study in details the di-photon correlations in quark-nucleus and proton-nucleus collisions at RHIC and the LHC. We show that the single fragmentation di-photon produces the away side correlations peak, and the double fragmentation component of prompt di-photon is responsible for the near-side peak, and the long-range in rapidity near-side azimut…
The stochastic dynamics of c and b quarks in the fireball created in nucleus-nucleus collisions at RHIC and LHC is studied employing a relativistic Langevin equation, based on a picture of multiple uncorrelated random collisions with the medium. Heavy-quark transport coefficients are evaluated within a pQCD approach, with a proper HTL resummation of medium effects for soft scatterings. The Langevin equation is embedded in a multi-step setup developed to study heavy-flavor observables in pp and AA collisions, starting from a NLO pQCD calculation of initial heavy-quark yields, complemented in th…
A snapshot of the results for heavy-flavour observables in heavy-ion (AA) collisions at RHIC and LHC obtained with our transport calculations is displayed. The initial charm and beauty production is simulated through pQCD tools (POWHEG+PYTHIA) and is validated through the comparison with data from pp collisions. The propagation of c and b quarks in the medium formed in heavy-ion collisions is studied through a transport setup based on the relativistic Langevin equation. With respect to past works we perform a more systematic study, providing results with different choices of transport coeffici…
We show that we can reproduce all the features of bottomonium suppression in both proton-nucleus and nucleus-nucleus collisions at LHC energies in a comover-interaction picture. For each collisions system, we use the measured {\it relative} suppression of the excited $Υ$(2S) and $Υ$(3S) states to $Υ$(1S) by ATLAS and CMS to parametrise the scattering cross sections of all $S$- and $P$-wave bottomonia with the comoving particles created during the collisions. In addition to a single nonpertubative parameter, these cross sections depend on the momentum distribution of these comovers which we fou…
Leptogenic Supersymmetry is a scenario characterized by copious lepton production in cascade decays. Due to the high lepton multiplicity and the lack of significant missing energy, leptogenic supersymmetry provides very clean channels which can be probed already with the early LHC data. Furthermore, the Higgs may be discovered in the h->b bbar mode because the leptons accompanying Higgs production efficiently suppress the background.
The LHC brings nuclear collisions to the TeV scale for the first time and the first data show the qualitative differences of this new regime. The corresponding phase-space available encompasses completely uncharted regions of QCD in which high-density or high-temperature domains can be identified. Proton-nucleus runs are essential for a complete interpretation of the data and for the study of new regimes dominated by large occupation numbers in the hadronic wave function. I comment here the physics opportunities for p+Pb runs at the LHC and d+Au runs at RHIC and the corresponding needs in view…
We present a study of the heavy-flavor dynamics in nucleus-nucleus collisions. The initial (hard) production of c and b quarks is taken from NLO pQCD predictions. The presence of a hot medium (a Quark Gluon Plasma described by hydrodynamics) affects the final spectra of open-charm (beauty) hadrons and their decay electrons with respect to what found in pp collisions. The propagation of c and b quarks in the plasma is based on a picture of multiple uncorrelated random collisions, described by a relativistic Langevin equation. A microscopic evaluation of the transport coefficients is provided wi…
We provide quantitative predictions for the rapidity, centrality and energy dependencies of inclusive charged-hadron productions for the forthcoming LHC measurements in nucleus-nucleus collisions based on the idea of gluon saturation in the color-glass condensate framework. Our formulation gives very good descriptions of the first data from the LHC for the inclusive charged-hadron production in proton-proton collisions, the deep inelastic scattering at HERA at small Bjorken-x, and the hadron multiplicities in nucleus-nucleus collisions at RHIC.
PACIAE, a parton and hadron cascade model, is utilized to systematically investigate strange particle production and strangeness enhancement in Au+Au collision and in Pb+Pb collision with the 200GeV at RHIC and 2.76TeV at LHC, respectively. The experimental results at different centrality, which come from the STAR collaboration and the ALICE collaboration, are well described by the PACIAE model. This may represent the importance of the parton and hadron rescatterings, as well as the reduction mechanism of strange quark suppression, added in the PACIAE model.
We show that we can reach a global and coherent description of bottomonium suppression in both proton-nucleus and nucleus-nucleus collisions at the LHC energies. The measured relative suppression of the excited bottomonium states as compared to their ground state allows us to constrain the scattering cross sections between the bottomonia and the comovers created during the collisions. Our result hints at a similar energy distribution of these comovers in the environment created by proton-nucleus and nucleus-nucleus collisions. Along the way of our study, we also update our knowledge for the bo…
These proceedings discuss a possible new search strategy for a light Higgs boson at the LHC, in high-pt WH and ZH production where the Higgs boson decays to a single collimated b-bbar jet. Material is included that is complementary to what was shown in the original article, arXiv:0802.2470.
Cross sections for the concurrent production of pairs of quarkonia (J/psi, Upsilon) and/or gauge bosons (W, Z) from double-parton scatterings (DPS) in high-energy proton-nucleus and nucleus-nucleus collisions at the LHC are calculated. The estimates are based on next-to-leading-order perturbative QCD predictions, including nuclear modifications of the parton densities, for the corresponding single-scattering cross sections. Expected event rates for J/psi+J/psi, J/psi+Upsilon, J/psi+W, J/psi+Z, Upsilon+Upsilon, Upsilon+W, Upsilon+Z, and same-sign W+W production in their (di)leptonic decay modes…
Proton-nucleus collisions (p+A) at LHC energies provide a rigorous test of the Color Glass Condensate (CGC), a model proposed to describe the high energy limit of Quantum Chromodynamics. In the CGC the average multiplicity of charged particles at midrapidity in p+A collisions depends logarithmically on the number of participants, $N_{part}$. In contrast, the Wounded Nucleon Model (WNM) of independent nucleon-nucleon scatterings, verified at RHIC energies, predicts that multiplicity in p+A depends linearly on $N_{part}$. We argue that for the first time, the dependence of mean multiplicity on $…
Apparently universal trends have been observed in relativistic nucleus-nucleus collisions up to RHIC energies. Here, we review these trends and we discuss their agnostic extrapolation to heavy ion collisions at the LHC.
The potential of the ALICE, ATLAS, CMS and LHCb detectors for the measurement of quarkonium in heavy-ion collisions, both in nucleus-nucleus (A-A) and in proton-nucleus (p-A) interactions, in the years 2015 until about 2030 in the LHC Runs 2, 3 and 4 with larger statistics and detector upgrades is described. A selection of newly available observables is discussed.
In this paper, it is shown that in hadron-nucleus and nucleus-nucleus collisions, the main source for central exclusive diffractive Higgs production is photon-photon fusion. At the LHC energy, the total cross section for this process is about 0.6 pb (for proton-gold scattering), and 3.9 nb (for gold-gold collision) while the gluon-gluon fusion leads to the value of the cross section for CED Higgs production which is about 0.1 nb and 3.9 pb respectively.
The production of same-sign W-boson pairs from double parton scatterings (DPS) in proton-lead (p-Pb) collisions at the CERN Large Hadron Collider is studied. The signal and background cross sections are estimated with next-to-leading-order perturbative QCD calculations using nuclear parton distribution functions for the Pb ion. At sqrt(sNN) = 8.8 TeV the cross section for the DPS process is about 150 pb, i.e. 600 times larger than that in proton-proton collisions at the same centre-of-mass energy and 1.5 times higher than the pPb --> WW+2-jets single-parton background. The measurement of such …
We review the status of the QCD corrected cross sections and kinematic distributions for the production of a Higgs boson in association with top quark or bottom quark pairs at the Fermilab Tevatron and at the LHC. Results for b-bbar-H production are presented in the Minimal Supersymmetric Model, where the rates can be greatly enhanced relative to the Standard Model rates. We place particular emphasis on theoretical uncertainties due to renormalization and factorization scale dependence and on the uncertainties coming from the Parton Distribution Functions.
We investigate the potential for enhancing search sensitivity for signals having charm quarks in the final state, using the sizable bottom-mistagging rate for charm quarks at the LHC. Provided that the relevant background processes contain light quarks instead of charm quarks, the application of b-tagging on charm quark-initiated jets enables us to reject more background events than signal ones due to the relatively small mistagging rate for light quarks. The basic idea is tested with two rare top decay processes: i) t -> c h -> c b bbar and ii) t -> b H+ -> b bbar c where h and H+ denote the …
An experimental overview of the energy dependence of strangeness production is presented. The strange hadrons are considered a good probe to study the QCD matter created in relativistic nucleus-nucleus collisions. The heavy-ion experiments at SPS, RHIC, and LHC have recorded a wealth of data in proton-proton, proton-nucleus and nucleus-nucleus collisions at several beam energies. In this proceeding, I discuss the invariant yield and azimuthal anisotropy measurement of strange hadrons in nucleus-nucleus collisions at SPS, RHIC, and LHC.
The transverse momentum spectra of charged particles produced in proton(deuteron)-nucleus and nucleus-nucleus collisions at high energies are analyzed by the Hagedorn thermal model and the standard distribution in terms of multi-component. The experimental data measured in central and peripheral gold-gold (Au-Au) and deuteron-gold ($d$-Au) collisions by the PHENIX Collaboration at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC), as well as in central and peripheral lead-lead (Pb-Pb) and proton-lead ($p$-Pb) collisions by the ALICE Collaboration at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) are fitted by the t…
Simple power counting arguments in the dilute-dense framework of the Color Glass Condensate (CGC) Effective Field Theory predict that even and odd azimuthal anisotropy harmonics of two-particle correlations in proton-nucleus collisions at the LHC will respectively satisfy v^2_{2n} ~ N_{ch}^0 and v^2_{2n+1} ~ N_{ch}, where N_{ch} denotes the number of charged particles. We show that these expectations are borne out qualitatively, and even quantitatively, within systematic uncertainties, for v_2 and v_4 in comparisons with data from the ATLAS collaboration. We also observe that ATLAS data for th…
We present results on rapidity and transverse momentum distributions of inclusive charm quark production in hadronic and heavy-ion collisions at RHIC and LHC energies, including the next-to-leading order, $O(α_s^3)$, radiative corrections and the nuclear shadowing effect. We determine the hadronic and the {\it effective} (in-medium) K-factor for the differential and total inclusive charm cross sections. We find the fraction of central and inelastic events that contain at least one charm quark pair at LHC energies and obtain the effective $A$-dependence of the inclusive charm production in prot…
We present a study of $τ^{+}τ^{-}$ lepton pair production in Pb+Pb collisions at $\sqrt{s_{NN}}$ = 5.5 TeV. The larger $τ^{\pm}$ mass ($\sim$ 1.77 GeV) compared to $e^{\pm}$ and $μ^{\pm}$ leads to considerably small hadronic contribution to the $τ^{+}τ^{-}$ pair invariant mass ($M$) distribution relative to the production from thermal partonic sources. The quark-anti-quark annihilation processes via intermediary virtual photon, Z and Higgs bosons have been considered for the production of $ τ^{+}τ^{-}$. We observe that the contribution from Drell-Yan process dominates over thermal yield for $τ…
We outline the case for heavy-ion-physics studies using the multi-TeV lead LHC beams in the fixed-target mode. After a brief contextual reminder, we detail the possible contributions of AFTER@LHC to heavy-ion physics with a specific emphasis on quarkonia. We then present performance simulations for a selection of observables. These show that $Υ(nS)$, $J/ψ$ and $ψ(2S)$ production in heavy-ion collisions can be studied in new energy and rapidity domains with the LHCb and ALICE detectors. We also discuss the relevance to analyse the Drell-Yan pair production in asymmetric nucleus-nucleus collisio…
We present a detailed discussion on the doubly charmed baryon $Ξ_{cc}$ production at the RHIC and LHC via the proton-nucleus ($p$-N) and nucleus-nucleus (N-N) collision modes. The extrinsic charm mechanism via the subprocesses $g+c\to (cc)[n]+\bar{c}$ and $c+c\to (cc)[n]+g$ together with the gluon-gluon fusion mechanism via the subprocess $g+g\to(cc)[n]+\bar{c}+\bar{c}$ have been taken into consideration, where the intermediate diquark is in $[n]=[^1S_0]_{\bf 6}$-state or $[^3S_1]_{\bar{\bf 3}}$-state, respectively. Total and differential cross sections have been discussed under various collis…
Measurements of two-particle angular correlations of inclusive charged particles as well as identified strange hadron in pp and pPb collisions are presented over a wide range in pseudorapidity and full azimuth. The data were collected using the CMS detector at the LHC, with nucleon-nucleon center-of-mass energy of 5.02 TeV for pPb collisions and 5, 7, 13 TeV for pp collisions. The results are compared to semi-peripheral PbPb collision data at center-of-mass energy of 2.76 TeV, covering similar charged-particle multiplicity ranges of the events. For high-multiplicity pp and pPb events, a clear …
We apply a Color Glass Condensate+Non-Relativistic QCD (CGC+NRQCD) framework to compute $J/ψ$ production in deuteron-nucleus collisions at RHIC and proton-nucleus collisions at the LHC. Our results match smoothly at high $p_\perp$ to a next-to-leading order perturbative QCD + NRQCD computation. Excellent agreement is obtained for $p_\perp$ spectra at RHIC and LHC for central and forward rapidities, as well as for the normalized ratio $R_{pA}$ of these results to spectra in proton-proton collisions. In particular, we observe that the $R_{pA}$ data is strongly bounded by our computations of the …
The observation of long range ridge-like structure in the near-side region of the two particle $Δη-Δϕ$ correlations as measured by LHC experiments in high multiplicity p$-$p collisions indicated towards the presence of collective effects which are similar to that observed in p$-$A(nucleon-nucleus) and A$-$A (nucleus-nucleus) collisions. The two particle correlation between the charged particles in $Δη-Δϕ$ for p$-$p collisions at $\sqrt{s}$ = 7 TeV and 13 TeV is studied using Pythia 8 event generator within the framework of final-state partonic color reconnection effects as well as the microsco…
This report reviews the study of open heavy-flavour and quarkonium production in high-energy hadronic collisions, as tools to investigate fundamental aspects of Quantum Chromodynamics, from the proton and nucleus structure at high energy to deconfinement and the properties of the Quark-Gluon Plasma. Emphasis is given to the lessons learnt from LHC Run 1 results, which are reviewed in a global picture with the results from SPS and RHIC at lower energies, as well as to the questions to be addressed in the future. The report covers heavy flavour and quarkonium production in proton-proton, proton-…
The CP-violating version of the Minimal Supersymmetric Standard Model (MSSM) is an example of a model where experimental data do not preclude the presence of light Higgs bosons in the range around 10 -- 110 GeV. Such light Higgs bosons, decaying almost wholly to b-bbar pairs, may be copiously produced at the LHC, but would remain inaccessible to conventional Higgs searches because of intractable QCD backgrounds. We demonstrate that a significant number of these light Higgs bosons would be boosted strongly enough for the pair of daughter $b$-jet pairs to appear as a single `fat' jet with substr…
ATLAS and CMS report indications of a Higgs boson at M_h 125 GeV. In addition, CMS data show a tenuous bump in the ZZ channel, at about 320 GeV. We make the bold assumption that it might be the indication of a secondary line corresponding to the heaviest scalar Higgs boson of Minimal Supersymmetry, H, and discuss the viability of this hypothesis. We discuss also the case of a heavier H, the relevance of the b bbar decay channel is underlined.
