Measurement of the W-+/- Z boson pair-production cross section in pp collisions at root s=13 TeV with the ATLAS detector
Abstract
The production of W+- Z events in proton-proton collisions at a centre-of-mass energy of 13 TeV is measured with the ATLAS detector at the LHC. The collected data correspond to an integrated luminosity of 3.2 fbMINUS SIGN 1.
The W+- Z candidates are reconstructed using leptonic decays of the gauge bosons into electrons or muons. The measured inclusive cross section in the detector fiducial region for leptonic decay modes is σfid.
W+- ZRIGHTWARDS ARROW ν = 63.2 +- 3.2 (stat.) +- 2.6 (sys.) +- 1.5 (lumi.) fb. In comparison, the next-toleading- order Standard Model prediction is 53.4+3.6 MINUS SIGN 2.8 fb.
The extrapolation of the measurement from the fiducial to the total phase space yields σtot. W+- Z = 50.6 +-2.6 (stat.)+- 2.0 (sys.)+-0.9 (th.)+-1.2 (lumi.) pb, in agreement with a recent next-to-next-to-leading-order calculation of 48.2+1.1 MINUS SIGN 1.0 pb.
The cross section as a function of jet multiplicity is also measured, together with the charge-dependent W+ Z and WMINUS SIGN Z cross sections and their ratio.