Measurement of $d\sigma/dy$ of Drell-Yan $e^+e^-$ pairs in the $Z$ Mass Region from $p\bar{p}$ Collisions at $\sqrt{s}=1.96$ TeV

TL;DR

This paper presents a precise measurement of the Drell-Yan electron-positron pair production cross section and rapidity distribution in proton-antiproton collisions at 1.96 TeV, comparing results with advanced QCD predictions.

Contribution

First measurement of $d\sigma/dy$ for Drell-Yan pairs in the Z mass region at Tevatron energies with detailed comparison to NNLO QCD calculations.

Findings

Measured total cross section: 257 ± 16 pb.

Good agreement with NNLO QCD predictions using recent PDFs.

Validated the accuracy of NNLO calculations for Drell-Yan processes.

Abstract

We report on a CDF measurement of the total cross section and rapidity distribution, $d\sigma/dy$, for $q\bar{q}\to \gamma^{*}/Z\to e^{+}e^{-}$ events in the $Z$ boson mass region ($66<M_{ee}<116$GeV/c$^2$) produced in $p\bar{p}$ collisions at $\sqrt{s}=1.96$TeV with 2.1fb$^{-1}$ of integrated luminosity. The measured cross section of $257\pm16$pb and $d\sigma/dy$ distribution are compared with Next-to-Leading-Order(NLO) and Next-to-Next-to-Leading-Order(NNLO) QCD theory predictions with CTEQ and MRST/MSTW parton distribution functions (PDFs). There is good agreement between the experimental total cross section and $d\sigma/dy$ measurements with theoretical calculations with the most recent NNLO PDFs.