Higgs boson as a gluon trigger: the study of QCD in high pile-up environments

TL;DR

This paper explores using Higgs boson production as a gluon trigger to study QCD in high pile-up environments at the LHC, proposing ratio measurements to mitigate pile-up effects.

Contribution

It introduces a novel approach of using Higgs boson production to probe QCD, comparing it with Drell-Yan processes and analyzing pile-up stable observables.

Findings

Ratios of Higgs to Drell-Yan observables show stability under high pile-up.

Monte Carlo simulations indicate potential for QCD studies in challenging conditions.

Higgs production provides a direct gluon probe in high pile-up environments.

Abstract

In the forthcoming high-luminosity phase of the LHC many of the most interesting measurements for precision QCD studies are hampered by large pile-up conditions, especially at not very high transverse momenta. However, with the recently discovered Higgs boson, which couples in the heavy top limit directly to gluons, we have access to a novel production process to probe QCD by a colour-singlet current. In this study we compare observables in Higgs boson and Drell-Yan production and investigate whether measuring ratios or subtractions can yield results that are stable in high pile-up environments, and yet sensitive to (small-$p_{\text{T}}$) QCD physics in gluon fusion processes. We present results of Monte Carlo event generator calculations for a few specific examples.