We present a computation of NNLO QCD corrections to the production of a Higgs boson in association with a $W$ boson at the LHC followed by the decay of the Higgs boson to a $b\bar{b}$ pair. At variance with previous NNLO QCD studies of the same process, we treat $b$ quarks as massive. An important advantage of working with massive $b$ quarks is that it makes the use of flavor jet algorithms unnecessary and allows us to employ conventional jet algorithms to define $b$ jets. We compare NNLO QCD descriptions of the associated $WH(b\bar{b})$ production with massive and massless $b$ quarks and also contrast them with the results provided by parton showers. We find ${\cal O}(5\%)$ differences in fiducial cross sections computed with massless and massive $b$ quarks. We also observe that much larger differences between massless and massive results, as well as between fixed-order and parton-shower results, can arise in selected kinematic distributions.
The fully differential computation of the hadronic production cross section of a Higgs boson via bottom quarks is presented at NNLO in QCD. Several differential distributions with their corresponding scale uncertainties are presented for the 8 TeV LHC. This is the first application of the method of non-linear mappings for NNLO differential calculations at hadron colliders.
The resummed transverse-momentum distribution for Higgs bosons produced via bottom-quark annihilation at the LHC is presented. Our results are obtained in the five-flavor scheme to NNLO+NNLL accuracy. We present a theoretical prediction which consistently matches the cross section at small and large transverse momenta. Theoretical uncertainties are derived from a variation of the unphysical scales entering the calculation. Their size is significantly reduced with respect to lower orders.
We present next-to-next-to leading order (NNLO) quantum electrodynamics (QED) corrections to the production of the Higgs boson in bottom quark annihilation at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) in the five flavor scheme. We have systematically included the NNLO corrections resulting from the interference of quantum chromodynamics (QCD) and QED interactions. We have investigated the infrared (IR) structure of the bottom quark form factor up to two loop level in QED and in QCD$\times$QED using K+G equation. We find that the IR poles in the form factor are controlled by the universal cusp, collinear…
We extend the already existing two-loop calculation of the effective bottom-Yukawa coupling in the MSSM. In addition to the resummation of the dominant corrections for large values of tg$β$, we include the subleading terms related to the trilinear Higgs coupling $A_b$ and contributions induced by the electroweak gauge couplings. This calculation has been extended to the NNLO corrections to the MSSM strange-Yukawa coupling. Our analysis leads to residual theoretical uncertainties of the effective Yukawa couplings at the per-cent level.
The decay of a light Higgs boson to bottom quarks is dominant and can be exploited for the discovery of the Higgs particle and the measurement of its properties at the LHC and future collider experiments. We perform a first computation of the fully differential decay at next-next-to-leading order in perturbative QCD. We employ a novel method of non-linear mappings for the treatment of singularities in the radiative processes which contribute to the decay width. This constitutes the first physical application of the method.
We consider the production of a Standard Model Higgs boson decaying to bottom quarks in association with a vector boson W/Z in hadron collisions. We present a fully exclusive calculation of QCD radiative corrections both for the production cross section and for the Higgs boson decay rate up to next-to-next-to-leading order (NNLO) accuracy. Our calculation also includes the leptonic decay of the vector boson with finite-width effects and spin correlations. We consider typical kinematical cuts applied in the experimental analyses at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) and we find that the full NNLO …
An importance of the detailed studies of the theoretical QCD predictions for the decay width of Standard Model Higgs boson into bottom quarks, in the case when $\rm{M_H\leq 2M_W}$, is emphasized. The effects of higher order perturbative QCD corrections up to order $α_s^4$-terms are considered. The resummations of the $π^2$ terms resulting from analytical continuation, typical of Minkowskian quantities, is undertaken for the $Γ(H\to\bar{b}b)$ decay width. The uncertainties in the calculation of this decay width are analyzed.
We present the inclusive transverse momentum distribution for Higgs bosons produced in bottom quark annihilation at the LHC. The results are obtained in the five-flavor scheme. The soft and collinear terms at small $p_T$ are resummed through NNLL accuracy and matched to the NNLO transverse momentum distribution at large $p_T$. We find that the theoretical uncertainty, derived from a variation of the unphysical scales entering the calculation, is significantly reduced with respect to lower orders.
We report on the first fully differential calculation of the next-to-next-to-leading-order (NNLO) QCD radiative corrections to the production of bottom-quark pairs at hadron colliders. The calculation is performed by using the $q_T$ subtraction formalism to handle and cancel infrared singularities in real and virtual contributions. The computation is implemented in the Matrix framework, thereby allowing us to efficiently compute arbitrary infrared-safe observables in the four-flavour scheme. We present selected predictions for bottom-quark production at the Tevatron and at the LHC at different…
We present a next-to-next-to-leading order (NNLO) QCD calculation of the bottom-induced contributions to the production of a Higgs boson plus a jet, i.e. the process $p p \rightarrow H +j$ to $\mathcal{O}(y_b^2 α_s^3)$. We work in the five-flavor scheme (5FS) in which the bottom quark mass is retained only in the coupling to the Higgs boson. Our calculation uses $N$-jettiness slicing to regulate infrared divergences, allowing for fully-differential predictions for collider observables. After extensively validating the methodology, we present results for the 13 TeV LHC. Our NNLO predictions sho…
We present predictions for hadronic decays of the Higgs boson at next-to-next-to-leading order (NNLO) in QCD matched with parton shower based on the POWHEG framework. Those include decays into bottom quarks with full bottom-quark mass dependence, light quarks, and gluons in the heavy top quark effective theory. Our calculations describe exclusive decays of the Higgs boson with leading logarithmic accuracy in the Sudakov region and next-to-leading order (NLO) accuracy matched with parton shower in the three-jet region, with normalizations fixed to the partial width at NNLO. We estimated remaini…
We calculate threshold soft-gluon corrections to total cross sections and transverse momentum distributions for bottom and charm quark production in fixed-target experiments, considering both pp and pi- p interactions. We investigate the quality of the near threshold soft-gluon approximation at next-to-leading order (NLO) and calculate next-to-next-to-leading order (NNLO) corrections through next-to-next-to-next-to-leading-logarithmic (NNNLL) accuracy, including some virtual terms. We find that the NNLO threshold corrections reduce the factorization and renormalization scale dependence of the …
We consider the decay of a neutral Higgs boson of arbitrary CP nature to a massive quark antiquark pair at next-to-next-to-leading order in perturbative QCD. Our analysis is made at the differential level using the antenna subtraction framework. We apply our general set-up to the decays of a CP-even and CP-odd heavy Higgs boson to a top-quark top-antiquark pair and to the decay of the 125 GeV Higgs boson to a massive bottom-quark bottom-antiquark pair. In the latter case we calculate, in particular, the two-jet, three-jet, and four-jet decay rates and, for two-jet events, the energy distributi…
We present the first results on the two-loop massless QCD corrections to the four-point amplitude $b+\overline{b} \rightarrow H+H$ in the five flavor scheme, treating bottom quarks as massless. This amplitude is sensitive to the trilinear Higgs boson coupling. Our two-loop result for this amplitude constitutes of purely virtual contributions to the next-to-next-to-leading order QCD predictions for the production of a pair of Higgs bosons at the Large Hadron Collider. Using these two loop amplitudes and exploiting the universality of the soft contributions in perturbative QCD, we obtain the NNL…
This article describes the code SusHi (for "Supersymmetric Higgs") which calculates the cross sections $pp/p\bar{p}\rightarrowϕ+X$ in gluon fusion and bottom-quark annihilation in the SM and the MSSM, where $ϕ$ is any of the neutral Higgs bosons within these models. Apart from inclusive cross sections up to NNLO QCD, differential cross sections with respect to the Higgs' transverse momentum $p_T$ and (pseudo-)rapidity $y(η)$ can be calculated through NLO QCD. In case of gluon fusion, SusHi contains NLO QCD contributions from the third family of quarks and squarks, NNLO corrections due to top-q…
We present the calculation of next-to-next-to-leading order (NNLO) corrections in perturbative QCD for the production of a Higgs boson decaying into a pair of bottom quarks in association with a leptonically decaying weak vector boson: $\mathrm{pp} \to V \mathrm{H} + X \to \ell\bar{\ell}\;\mathrm{b\bar{b}} + X$. We consider the corrections to both the production and decay sub-processes, retaining a fully differential description of the final state including off-shell propagators of the Higgs and vector boson. The calculation is carried out using the antenna subtraction formalism and is impleme…
We compute theoretical predictions for the production of a W-boson in association with a bottom-quark pair at hadron colliders at next-to-next-to-leading order (NNLO) in QCD, including the leptonic decay of the W-boson, while treating the bottom quark as massless. This calculation constitutes the very first $2 \to 3$ process with a massive external particle to be studied at such a perturbative order. We derive an analytic expression for the required two-loop five-particle amplitudes in the leading colour approximation employing finite-field methods. Numerical results for the cross section and …
Decay rates of unpolarized top quarks into longitudinally and transversally polarized W bosons are calculated to second order in the strong coupling constant alpha_s. Including the finite bottom quark mass and electroweak effects, the Standard Model predictions for the W boson helicity fractions are F_L=0.687(5), F_+=0.0017(1), and F_-=0.311(5).
We include finite top- and bottom-mass effects in the next-to-next-to-leading order parton shower (NNLOPS) event generator for inclusive Higgs boson production in gluon fusion based upon the POWHEG+MiNLO approach. Since fixed-order results for quark-mass effects only reach NLO accuracy, we add them to the NNLOPS generator at that accuracy. We explore uncertainties related to the unknown all-order logarithmic structure of bottom-mass effects by comparing the assumption of full exponentiation to no exponentiation at all. Phenomenological results showing the effects of finite quark-masses in the …
We present results for associated Higgs+n-jet production in bottom quark annihilation, for n=0 and n>=1 at NNLO and NLO accuracy, respectively. We consider both the cases with and without b-tagging. Numerical results are presented for parameters relevant for experiments at the LHC.
We derive the integrated forms of specific initial-final tree-level four-parton antenna functions involving a massless initial-state parton and a massive final-state fermion as hard radiators. These antennae are needed in the subtraction terms required to evaluate the double real corrections to $t\bar{t}$ hadronic production at the NNLO level stemming from the partonic processes $q\bar{q}\to t\bar{t}q'\bar{q}'$ and $gg\to t\bar{t}q\bar{q}$.
As a first step towards the application of the antenna subtraction formalism to NNLO QCD reactions with massive quarks, we determine the real radiation antenna function and its integrated counterpart for reactions of the type $S \to Q{\bar Q} q {\bar q}$, where $S$ denotes an uncolored initial state and $Q$, $q$ a massive and massless quark, respectively. We compute the corresponding integrated antenna function in terms of harmonic polylogarithms. As an application and check of our results we calculate the contribution proportional to $α_s^2 e^2_Q N_f$ to the inclusive heavy-quark pair product…
We analyze, in the antenna subtraction framework, the real radiation antenna functions for processes involving the production of a pair of heavy quarks and two gluons by an uncolored initial state at NNLO QCD. We provide explicit expressions for these functions and discuss their infrared singular behaviour. Our main results are the corresponding integrated antenna functions which are computed analytically. They are expressed in terms of harmonic polylogarithms.
Introducing version 2 of the code vh@nnlo, we study the effects of a number of new-physics scenarios on the Higgs-Strahlung process. In particular, the cross section is evaluated within a general 2HDM and the MSSM. While the Drell-Yan-like contributions are consistently taken into account by a simple rescaling of the SM result, the gluon-initiated contribution is supplemented by squark-loop mediated amplitudes, and by the $s$-channel exchange of additional scalars which may lead to conspicuous interference effects. The latter holds as well for bottom-quark initiated Higgs Strahlung, which is a…
We present compact analytic formulas that describe the decay of colorless particles to both $q \bar q$ and $gg$ final states through next-to-next-to-leading order in perturbative QCD in the context of the nested soft-collinear subtraction scheme. In addition to their relevance for the description of decays like $V \to q \bar q'$, $V= Z,W$, $H \to b \bar b$ and $H \to gg$, these results provide an important building block for calculating NNLO QCD corrections to arbitrary processes at colliders within the nested soft-collinear subtraction scheme.
We describe calculations of b b-bar production to next-to-next-to-leading order (NNLO) and next-to-next-to-leading logarithm (NNLL) near threshold in pp interactions. Our calculations are in good agreement with the b b-bar total cross section measured by HERA-B.
We determine, in the antenna subtraction framework for handling infrared divergences in higher order QCD calculations, the real-virtual antenna functions for processes involving the production of a pair of massive quarks by an uncolored initial state at NNLO QCD. The integrated leading and subleading color real-virtual antenna functions are computed analytically in terms of (cyclotomic) harmonic polylogarithms. As a by-product and check we compute $R_Q=σ(e^+e^-\to γ^*\to Q\bar{Q}X)/σ(e^+e^-\to γ^*\toμ^+μ^-)$ and compare with existing results. Our result for $R_Q$ is exact to order $α_s^2$.
In this contribution the QCD next-to-next-to-leading order (NNLO) matching coefficients to the branching ratio $B_s \to μ^+ μ^-$ in the Standard Model (SM) and to $\bar{B}\to X_s γ$ in the Two Higgs Doublet Model (2HDM) are discussed. In both cases a three-loop matching between the full and effective theory was performed, which leads to a significant reduction of the scale uncertainty.
We present the calculation of QCD radiative corrections to heavy-quark production at NNLO. The calculation is implemented in an updated version of \textsc{Matrix}, which allows us to obtain multidifferential predictions for stable top quarks. We also report on the NNLO calculation for $b{\bar b}$ production and comment on the inclusion of top-quark decays and of the extension of our results to $t\bar tH$.
In this contribution, the recent calculation of next-to-next-to-leading order QCD and next-to-leading order electroweak corrections to the decay $B_s\to μ^+μ^-$ is reviewed, and a detailed discussion of the uncertainty of the theory prediction is provided. Furthermore, we discuss the status of the next-to-next-to-leading order QCD corrections to $\bar{B} \to X_s γ$.
We present the computation of the double real and real-virtual contributions to top-antitop pair production in the quark-antiquark channel at leading colour. The $q \bar q \to t \bar{t} g$ amplitudes contributing to the real-virtual part are computed with OpenLoops, and their numerical stability in the soft and collinear regions is found to be sufficiently high to perform a realistic NNLO calculation in double precision. The subtraction terms required at real-real and real-virtual levels are constructed within the antenna subtraction formalism extended to deal with the presence of coloured mas…
We consider an extension of the Standard Model with an arbitrary number of heavy quarks having general couplings to the Higgs boson. We construct an effective Lagrangian integrating out quarks that are heavier than half the mass of the Higgs boson and compute the Wilson coefficient for the effective gluon-Higgs vertex through NNLO. We apply our result to a composite Higgs model with vector-like quarks coupling to the third generation quarks. In the heavy quark-mass approximation, we show that the suppression of the leading-order cross section with respect to the Standard Model does not depend …
The width difference $ΔΓ$ among the two mass eigenstates of the $B_s$-$\bar B_s$ system is measured with a precision of 7%. The theory prediction has a larger uncertainty which mainly stems from unknown perturbative higher-order QCD corrections. I discuss the subset of next-to-next-to-leading order diagrams proportional to $α_s^2\, N_f$, where $N_f=5$ is the number of quark flavours. The results are published in [1].
We consider Standard Model Higgs boson production in association with a Z boson in hadron collisions. We present a fully exclusive computation of QCD radiative corrections up to next-to-next-to-leading order (NNLO). Our calculation includes the Higgs boson decay to bottom quarks (b) in next-to-leading order QCD and the leptonic decay of the Z boson with finite-width effects and spin correlations. The computation is implemented in a parton level Monte Carlo program that makes possible to consider arbitrary kinematical cuts on the final-state leptons, the b jets and the associated QCD radiation,…
We describe the status of the calculation of the branching ratio for the decay \bar B^0 --> D^+ pi^- to NNLO in QCD factorization. Here, we present the result for the colour-singlet hard-scattering kernel. The calculation has been performed using multi-loop techniques like Laporta's reduction to master integrals, and Mellin-Barnes representations and differential equations for evaluating the latter.
We study the production of scalar and pseudoscalar Higgs bosons via gluon fusion and bottom-quark annihilation in the MSSM. Relying on the NNLO-QCD calculation implemented in the public code SusHi, we provide precise predictions for the Higgs-production cross section in six benchmark scenarios compatible with the LHC searches. We also provide a detailed discussion of the sources of theoretical uncertainty in our calculation. We examine the dependence of the cross section on the renormalization and factorization scales, on the precise definition of the Higgs-bottom coupling and on the choice of…
We compute perturbative matching coefficients to the Heavy Quark Effective Theory representation for the QCD effective local $ΔB=2$ Hamiltonian that determines the mass difference in $B^0-\bar{B}^0$ system of states. We report on the results at NNLO in the strong coupling constant for matching coefficients of two physical operators in HQET. Our results provide the firm confirmation that the recent NLO sum rules analysis of the bag parameter $B_q$ is stable with regard of inclusion of higher order radiative corrections. As a by-product of our calculation we give a fully analytical solution for …
A study is made of charm and bottom flavor matching conditions on parton densities. Starting from an $\bar{\rm MS}$ three-flavor density set, where the scale $μ< m_c$, and using the recently derived two-loop matching conditions, we provide a new set of four-flavor parton densities where $ m_c \le μ< m_b$ and five-flavor densities where $μ\ge m_b$. The effect of the next-to-next-to-leading order matching conditions on the evolution equations is important for scales just above the transition regions. This includes the small $x$ and small $Q^2$ domain studied by the H1 and ZEUS experiments at HER…
The cross section near the $t\bar t$ production threshold in $e^+e^-$ annihilation and $γγ$ collisions is discussed. The NNLO results within NRQCD are briefly overviewed.
We complete the analytic evaluation of the master integrals for the two-loop non-planar box diagrams contributing to the top-pair production in the quark-initiated channel, at next-to-next-to-leading order in QCD. The integrals are determined from their differential equations, which are cast into a canonical form using the Magnus exponential. The analytic expressions of the Laurent series coefficients of the integrals are expressed as combinations of generalized polylogarithms, which we validate with several numerical checks. We discuss the analytic continuation of the planar and the non-plana…
We present recent developments concerning Higgs production in bottom quark annihilation and gluon fusion. For bottom quark annihilation, we show the transverse momentum distribution of the associated jets. Furthermore, we discuss the distribution of events into n-jet bins for n=0 and n>0 at NNLO and NLO, respectively. For gluon fusion, the quality of the heavy-top limit for differential quantities at O(α_s^4) is studied by taking into account higher order terms in the 1/m_{top} expansion.
We briefly review the recent progress in the study of higher order corrections to hadron scattering processes involving top quark pairs in the final state. In particular, we discuss the Monte-Carlo simulation of the $pp \to t \bar{t} b \bar{b}$ process at the next-to-leading order with the help of the {\tt Helac-NLO} system, and the status of the soft-gluon resummation program for $pp \to t \bar{t}$ near threshold at the next-to-next-to-leading order.
We present analytic results for the partonic cross-sections contributing to the top-bottom interference in Higgs production via gluon fusion at hadron colliders at NLO accuracy in QCD. We develop a method of expansion in small bottom-mass for master integrals and combine it with the usual infinite top-mass effective theory. Our method of expansion admits a simple algorithmic description and can be easily generalized to any small parameter. These results for the integrated cross-sections will be needed in the computation of the renormalization counter-terms entering the computation of finite bo…
We calculate the contribution of the partonic processes gg->WZ q\bar{q} and gg -> W gamma q\bar{q} to WZ and W gamma pair production at hadron colliders, including anomalous triple gauge-boson couplings. We use the helicity method and include the decay of the W and Z-boson into leptons in the narrow-width approximation. In order to integrate over the q\bar{q} final state phase space we use an extended version of the subtraction method to NNLO and remove collinear singularities explicitly. Due to the large gluon density at low x, the gluon induced terms of vector-boson pair production are expec…
