Comparison of leading and next-to-leading logarithmic electroweak corrections to Higgs production

TL;DR

This paper derives an analytical expression for electroweak corrections to Higgs production via vector boson fusion, compares leading and next-to-leading logarithmic results, and assesses their accuracy for LHC energies.

Contribution

It introduces a closed-form resummation of electroweak corrections using soft-collinear effective theory and compares its precision with full next-to-leading-log calculations.

Findings

Leading-log approximation is accurate within 1% up to 10 TeV.

Electroweak corrections are larger than one-loop fixed order estimates at LHC energies.

The method simplifies incorporating electroweak corrections into simulation software.

Abstract

Using soft-collinear effective theory, the leading-log radiative electroweak corrections are written in a closed and analytical form for the hadronic cross section of Higgs production through vector boson fusion, qq->qqH, one of the most promising channels for studying the Higgs boson at the LHC. The simple leading-log resummation is compared with a full next-to-leading-log calculation, and its accuracy is found to be of order 1% up to 10 TeV, i.e. better than the accuracy of PDFs. Corrections are found to be larger than predicted by one-loop fixed order approximations at LHC energies. The method provides a simple way of incorporating the electroweak corrections in software packages, improving the accuracy of simulations.