NLO QCD corrections to W+W- gamma and Z Z gamma production with leptonic decays

TL;DR

This paper calculates the next-to-leading order QCD corrections for W+W- gamma and ZZ gamma production with leptonic decays at hadron colliders, showing significant impact on predictions for the LHC and Tevatron.

Contribution

It provides a comprehensive NLO QCD correction calculation including leptonic decays and flexible Monte Carlo implementation for these processes.

Findings

NLO corrections significantly alter LO cross section predictions.

Corrections affect both the magnitude and shape of distributions.

Results are applicable to LHC and Tevatron analyses.

Abstract

The computation of the NLO QCD corrections to the cross sections for W+W- gamma and ZZgamma production in hadronic collisions is presented. We consider the case of a real photon in the final state, but include full leptonic decays of the W and Z bosons. Numerical results for the LHC and the Tevatron are obtained through a fully flexible parton level Monte Carlo based on the structure of the VBFNLO program, allowing an easy implementation of arbitrary cuts and distributions. We show the dependence on scale variations of the integrated cross sections and provide evidence that NLO QCD corrections strongly modify the LO predictions for observables at the LHC both in magnitude and in shape.