Search for the neutral Higgs bosons of the Minimal Supersymmetric Standard Model in pp collisions at sqrt(s)=7 TeV with the ATLAS detector

TL;DR

This paper reports a search for neutral Higgs bosons predicted by the MSSM in proton-proton collisions at 7 TeV using the ATLAS detector, finding no significant excess and setting exclusion limits on their production.

Contribution

It provides the first search results for MSSM neutral Higgs bosons at 7 TeV with the ATLAS detector, establishing new exclusion limits over a range of masses and parameters.

Findings

No significant excess observed over background.

Exclusion limits set for Higgs boson production cross-section.

Constraints on MSSM parameters mA and tanbeta.

Abstract

A search for neutral Higgs bosons of the Minimal Supersymmetric Standard Model (MSSM) is reported. The analysis is based on a sample of proton-proton collisions at a centre-of-mass energy of 7 TeV recorded with the ATLAS detector at the Large Hadron Collider. The data were recorded in 2011 and correspond to an integrated luminosity of 4.7 fb-1 to 4.8 fb-1. Higgs boson decays into oppositely-charged muon or tau lepton pairs are considered for final states requiring either the presence or absence of b-jets. No statistically significant excess over the expected background is observed and exclusion limits at the 95% confidence level are derived. The exclusion limits are for the production cross-section of a generic neutral Higgs boson, phi, as a function of the Higgs boson mass and for h/H/A production in the MSSM as a function of the parameters mA and tanbeta in the mh-max scenario for mA in the range of 90 GeV to 500 GeV.