Precision Theory Predictions for Higgs and New-Physics Measurements at the LHC

• Applicant: Dr. Frank J. Tackmann
• Subject Area: Nuclear and Elementary Particle Physics, Quantum Mechanics, Relativity, Fields
• Term: from 2012 to 2018
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 209838826

The Standard Model of particle physics successfully describes all particle phenomena observed in laboratory experiments so far. A main goal of the experiments at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN is the discovery of the Higgs particle, which is an essential part of the Standard Model but has not yet been observed directly. Another goal is the search for new heavy particles outside the Standard Model, whose existence is expected from the astrophysical observation of dark matter as well as from strong theoretical motivations. Higgs and other heavy particles produced in proton-proton collisions at the LHC are identified by their decay products, which produce a characteristic signature involving in general collimated jets of particles in the detector. Obtaining precise experimental limits or measurements of the masses and couplings of the Higgs and new-physics particles requires theoretical predictions for signal and background processes with a specific number of such jets. The objective of the Emmy-Noether group is the precise theoretical calculation of the necessary cross sections for such processes. This requires the development and application of new field-theoretic methods that allow the analytic resummation of large perturbative corrections and the study of nonperturbative effects, and their combination with numerical simulations.

• DFG Programme: Independent Junior Research Groups