Professor Chris Hays

Abstract:

A search has been performed for the experimental signature of an isolated photon with high transverse momentum, at least one jet identified as originating from a bottom quark, and high missing transverse momentum. Such a final state may originate from supersymmetric models with gauge-mediated supersymmetry breaking in events in which one of a pair of higgsino-like neutralinos decays into a photon and a gravitino while the other decays into a Higgs boson and a gravitino. The search is performed using the full dataset of 7 TeV proton-proton collisions recorded with the ATLAS detector at the LHC in 2011, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 4.7 fb -1 . A total of 7 candidate events are observed while 7.5±2.2 events are expected from the Standard Model background. The results of the search are interpreted in the context of general gauge mediation to exclude certain regions of a benchmark plane for higgsino-like neutralino production. © 2013 CERN.

Abstract:

We measure the polarization of W bosons from top-quark (t) decays into final states with a charged lepton and jets, tt̄→W+bW -b̄→ℓνbqq̄′b̄, using the full Run II data set collected by the CDF II detector, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 8.7 fb-1. A model-independent method simultaneously determines the fraction of longitudinal (f0) and right-handed (f+) W bosons to yield f0=0.726±0. 066(stat)±0.067(syst) and f+=-0.045±0.044(stat) ±0.058(syst) with a correlation coefficient of -0.69. Additional results are presented under various standard model assumptions. No significant discrepancies with the standard model are observed. © 2013 American Physical Society.

Abstract:

The first observation of the production of a W boson with a single charm quark (c) jet in pp̄ collisions at √s=1.96 TeV is reported. The analysis uses data corresponding to 4.3 fb-1, recorded with the CDF II detector at the Fermilab Tevatron. Charm quark candidates are selected through the identification of an electron or muon from charm-hadron semileptonic decay within a hadronic jet, and a Wc signal is observed with a significance of 5.7 standard deviations. The production cross section σ Wc(pTc>20 GeV/c,|ηc|<1.5) ×B(W→ℓν) is measured to be 13.6-3.1+3.4 pb and is in agreement with theoretical expectations. From this result the magnitude of the quark-mixing matrix element Vcs is derived, |Vcs|=1. 08±0.16 along with a lower limit of |Vcs|>0.71 at the 95% confidence level, assuming that the Wc production through c to s quark coupling is dominant. © 2013 American Physical Society.

Abstract:

This paper describes a measurement of the flavour composition of dijet events produced in pp collisions at √s = 7 TeV using the ATLAS detector. The measurement uses the full 2010 data sample, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 39 pb⁻¹. Six possible combinations of light, charm and bottom jets are identified in the dijet events, where the jet flavour is defined by the presence of bottom, charm or solely light flavour hadrons in the jet. Kinematic variables, based on the properties of displaced decay vertices and optimised for jet flavour identification, are used in a multidimensional template fit to measure the fractions of these dijet flavour states as functions of the leading jet transverse momentum in the range 40 GeV to 500 GeV and jet rapidity |y| < 2.1. The fit results agree with the predictions of leading- and next-to-leading-order calculations, with the exception of the dijet fraction composed of bottom and light flavour jets, which is underestimated by all models at large transverse jet momenta. The ability to identify jets containing two b-hadrons, originating from e.g. gluon splitting, is demonstrated. The difference between bottom jet production rates in leading and subleading jets is consistent with the next-to-leading-order predictions.

Abstract:

A search for direct chargino production in anomaly-mediated supersymmetry breaking scenarios is performed in pp collisions at √s=7TeV using 4.7 fb-1 of data collected with the ATLAS experiment at the LHC. In these models, the lightest chargino is predicted to have a lifetime long enough to be detected in the tracking detectors of collider experiments. This analysis explores such models by searching for chargino decays that result in tracks with few associated hits in the outer region of the tracking system. The transverse-momentum spectrum of candidate tracks is found to be consistent with the expectation from the Standard Model background processes and constraints on chargino properties are obtained. © 2013 CERN for the benefit of the ATLAS collaboration.