Associated $\mathrm{Higgs}boson+\text{jet}s$ production at the LHC and Catani-Ciafaloni-Fiorani-Marchesini gluon dynamics in a proton

We consider the associated production of Higgs boson and hadronic jet(s) in $pp$ collisions at the LHC for the first time using the $k_T$-factorization approach. Our analysis is based on the off-shell gluon-gluon fusion subprocess, where nonzero transverse momenta of initial gluons are taken into account and covers $H\to \gamma \gamma$, $H\to Z{Z}^{*}\to 4l$ (with $l=e$, $\mu$), and $H\to W^{+}{W}^{-}\to e^{\pm }{\mu }^{\mp }\nu \overline{\nu }$ decay channels. The transverse momentum dependent (TMD) (or unintegrated) gluon densities in a proton are taken from Catani-Ciafaloni-Fiorani-Marchesini evolution equation. To simulate the kinematics of the produced jets, the TMD parton shower implemented into the Monte Carlo event generator cascade is applied. The comparison of our results with the latest experimental data taken by the CMS and ATLAS Collaborations at $\sqrt{s}=8$ and 13 TeV is presented. Our predictions are compared also with the results of conventional higher-order perturbative QCD calculations. We highlight observables, which are sensitive to the TMD gluon densities in a proton.

Figure 1

A0 (red) and JH’2013 set 2 (blue) TMD gluon distributions in a proton as functions of the transverse momentum $k_T$ at different $x$ values and typical scale $\mu =200\mathrm{GeV}$. The figure is made with TMDPlotter [62].

Figure 2

The differential cross sections of associated Higgs boson and jet production (in the diphoton decay channel) at $\sqrt{s}=13\mathrm{TeV}$ as functions of $N_{\text{jet}}$, leading jet transverse momentum and rapidity. The contributions from nongluon fusion subprocesses and nnlops predictions are taken from [1, 5]. The experimental data are from CMS [1] and ATLAS [5].

Figure 3

The differential cross sections of associated Higgs boson and jet production (in the diphoton decay channel) at $\sqrt{s}=13\mathrm{TeV}$ as functions of the rapidity difference between the diphoton system and leading jet $\mathrm{\Delta }{y}^{\gamma \gamma j_1}$, Zeppenfeld variable $|{\eta }^{j_1{j}_2}-{\eta }^{\gamma \gamma }|$, and azimuthal angle difference between the diphoton and dijet systems $\mathrm{\Delta }{\varphi }^{H;j_1{j}_2}$. The contributions from nongluon fusion subprocesses and nnlops predictions are taken from [1, 5]. The experimental data are from CMS [1] and ATLAS [5].

Figure 4

The differential cross sections of associated Higgs boson and jet production (in the $H\to Z{Z}^{*}$ decay channel) at $\sqrt{s}=8\mathrm{TeV}$ as functions of $N_{\text{jet}}$, leading jet transverse momentum, and rapidity difference between the Higgs boson and leading jet $\mathrm{\Delta }{y}^{H{j}_1}$. The contributions from nongluon fusion subprocesses and nnlops predictions are taken from [2, 6]. The experimental data are from CMS [2] and ATLAS [6].

Figure 5

The differential cross sections of associated Higgs boson and jet production (in the $H\to Z{Z}^{*}$ decay channel) at $\sqrt{s}=13\mathrm{TeV}$ as functions of $N_{\text{jet}}$ and leading jet transverse momentum. The contributions from nongluon fusion subprocesses and nnlops predictions are taken from [3, 7]. The experimental data are from CMS [3] and ATLAS [7].

Figure 6

The differential cross sections of associated Higgs boson and jet production (in the $H\to Z{Z}^{*}$ decay channel) at $\sqrt{s}=13\mathrm{TeV}$ as functions of the rapidity and azimuthal angle difference between the leading and subleading jets, invariant masses of Higgs-leading jet system and Higgs-dijet system. The contributions from nongluon fusion subprocesses and nnlops predictions are taken from [3, 7]. The experimental data are from CMS [3] and ATLAS [7].

Figure 7

The differential cross sections of associated Higgs boson and jet production (in the $H\to W^{+}{W}^{-}$ decay channel) at $\sqrt{s}=8$ (right panel) and 13 TeV (left panel) as functions of $N_{\text{jet}}$. The experimental data are from CMS [4] and ATLAS [8].

Figure 8

The differential cross sections of associated Higgs boson and jet production (in the $H\to \gamma \gamma$ decay channel) at $\sqrt{s}=8$ as functions of $N_{\text{jet}}$, $p_T^{\mathrm{l}\text{-jet}}$, $y^{\text{jet}}$. The fixed-order NNLO QCD results are taken from [20].