Strong and Yukawa two-loop contributions to Higgs scalar boson self-energies and pole masses in supersymmetry

I present results for the two-loop self-energy functions for neutral and charged Higgs scalar bosons in minimal supersymmetry. The contributions given here include all terms involving the QCD coupling, and those following from Feynman diagrams involving Yukawa couplings and scalar interactions that do not vanish as the electroweak gauge couplings are turned off. The impact of these contributions on the computation of pole masses of the neutral and charged Higgs scalar bosons is studied in a few examples.Comment: 23 pages, 9 figures, revtex4. New paragraph in introduction, more explanation of Figure

Summary of the CMS Discovery Potential for the MSSM SUSY Higgses

This work summarises the present understanding of the expected MSSM SUSY Higgs reach for CMS. Many of the studies presented here result from detailed detector simulations incorporating final CMS detector design and response. With 30 fb-1 the h -> gamma,gamma and h -> bb channels allow to cover most of the MSSM parameter space. For the massive A,H,H+ MSSM Higgs states the channels A,H -> tau,tau and H+ -> tau,nu turn out to be the most profitable ones in terms of mass reach and parameter space coverage. Consequently CMS has made a big effort to trigger efficiently on taus. Provided neutralinos and sleptons are not too heavy, there is an interesting complementarity in the reaches for A,H -> tau,tau and A,H -> chi,chi.Comment: 19 pages, 27 figure

Next-to-leading order QCD corrections to W+W- production via vector-boson fusion

Vector-boson fusion processes constitute an important class of reactions at hadron colliders, both for signals and backgrounds of new physics in the electroweak interactions. We consider what is commonly referred to as W+W- production via vector-boson fusion (with subsequent leptonic decay of the Ws), or, more precisely, e+ nu_e mu- nubar_mu + 2 jets production in proton-proton scattering, with all resonant and non-resonant Feynman diagrams and spin correlations of the final-state leptons included, in the phase-space regions which are dominated by t-channel electroweak-boson exchange. We compute the next-to-leading order QCD corrections to this process, at order alpha^6 alpha_s. The QCD corrections are modest, changing total cross sections by less than 10%. Remaining scale uncertainties are below 2%. A fully-flexible next-to-leading order partonic Monte Carlo program allows to demonstrate these features for cross sections within typical vector-boson-fusion acceptance cuts. Modest corrections are also found for distributions.Comment: 29 pages, 14 figure

Dominant next-to-leading order QCD corrections to Higgs plus three jet production in vector-boson fusion

We present the calculation of the dominant next to leading order QCD corrections to Higgs boson production in association with three jets via vector boson fusion in the form of a NLO parton-level Monte Carlo program. QCD corrections to integrated cross sections are modest, while the shapes of some kinematical distributions change appreciably at NLO. Scale uncertainties are shown to be reduced at NLO for the total cross section and for distributions. We consider a central jet veto at the LHC and analyze the veto probability for typical vector boson fusion cuts. Scale uncertainties of the veto probability are sufficiently small at NLO for precise Higgs coupling measurements at the LHC.Comment: 40 pages, 17 figures, 2 tables, published versio

Measuring the Higgs Sector

If we find a light Higgs boson at the LHC, there should be many observable channels which we can exploit to measure the relevant parameters in the Higgs sector. We use the SFitter framework to map these measurements on the parameter space of a general weak-scale effective theory with a light Higgs state of mass 120 GeV. Our analysis benefits from the parameter determination tools and the error treatment used in new--physics searches, to study individual parameters and their error bars as well as parameter correlations.Comment: 45 pages, Journal version with comments from refere

The Higgs Working Group: Summary Report (2001)

Report of the Higgs working group for the Workshop `Physics at TeV Colliders', Les Houches, France, 21 May - 1 June 2001. It contains 7 separate sections: A. Theoretical Developments B. Higgs Searches at the Tevatron C. Experimental Observation of an invisible Higgs Boson at LHC D. Search for the Standard Model Higgs Boson using Vector Boson Fusion at the LHC E. Study of the MSSM channel $A/H \to \tau \tau$ at the LHC F. Searching for Higgs Bosons in $t\bar t H$ Production G. Studies of Charged Higgs Boson Signals for the Tevatron and the LHCComment: 120 pages, latex, many figures, proceedings of the Workshop `Physics at TeV Colliders', Les Houches, France, 21 May - 1 June 2001, full Author list included in paper. Typos corrected, author list and acknowledgements completed. Convernors: D. Cavalli, A. Djouadi, K. Jakobs, A. Nikitenko, M. Spira, C.E.M. Wagner, W.-M. Ya

Bottom Production

We review the prospects for bottom production physics at the LHC.Comment: 74 pages, Latex, 71 figures, to appear in the Report of the ``1999 CERN Workshop on SM physics (and more) at the LHC'', P. Nason, G. Ridolfi, O. Schneider G.F. Tartarelli, P. Vikas (conveners

Difficult Scenarios for NMSSM Higgs Discovery at the LHC

We identify scenarios not ruled out by LEP data in which NMSSM Higgs detection at the LHC will be particularly challenging. We first review the `no-lose' theorem for Higgs discovery at the LHC that applies if Higgs bosons do not decay to other Higgs bosons - namely, with L=300 fb^-1, there is always one or more `standard' Higgs detection channel with at least a 5 sigma signal. However, we provide examples of no-Higgs-to-Higgs cases for which all the standard signals are no larger than 7 sigma implying that if the available L is smaller or the simulations performed by ATLAS and CMS turn out to be overly optimistic, all standard Higgs signals could fall below 5 sigma even in the no-Higgs-to-Higgs part of NMSSM parameter space. In the vast bulk of NMSSM parameter space, there will be Higgs-to-Higgs decays. We show that when such decays are present it is possible for all the standard detection channels to have very small significance. In most such cases, the only strongly produced Higgs boson is one with fairly SM-like couplings that decays to two lighter Higgs bosons (either a pair of the lightest CP-even Higgs bosons, or, in the largest part of parameter space, a pair of the lightest CP-odd Higgs bosons). A number of representative bench-mark scenarios of this type are delineated in detail and implications for Higgs discovery at various colliders are discussed.Comment: 31 pages, 5 figure

TESLA Technical Design Report Part III: Physics at an e+e- Linear Collider

The TESLA Technical Design Report Part III: Physics at an e+e- Linear ColliderComment: 192 pages, 131 figures. Some figures have reduced quality. Full quality figures can be obtained from http://tesla.desy.de/tdr. Editors - R.-D. Heuer, D.J. Miller, F. Richard, P.M. Zerwa