Searches for electroweak neutralino and chargino production in channels with Higgs, Z, and W bosons in pp collisions at 8 TeV

TL;DR

This paper reports on searches for supersymmetric particles, specifically neutralinos and charginos, in various decay channels involving Higgs, Z, and W bosons using 8 TeV proton-proton collision data, setting upper limits on their production.

Contribution

It presents the first comprehensive search for electroweak SUSY particles in multiple decay channels at 8 TeV, with new limits on neutralino and chargino masses and cross sections.

Findings

No evidence of SUSY particles was observed.

Upper limits were set on production cross sections at 95% confidence level.

Constraints on neutralino and chargino masses were established.

Abstract

Searches for supersymmetry (SUSY) are presented based on the electroweak pair production of neutralinos and charginos, leading to decay channels with Higgs, Z, and W bosons and undetected lightest SUSY particles (LSPs). The data sample corresponds to an integrated luminosity of about 19.5 inverse femtobarns of proton-proton collisions at a center-of-mass energy of 8 TeV collected in 2012 with the CMS detector at the LHC. The main emphasis is neutralino pair production in which each neutralino decays either to a Higgs boson (h) and an LSP or to a Z boson and an LSP, leading to hh, hZ, and ZZ states with missing transverse energy (ET(miss)). A second aspect is chargino-neutralino pair production, leading to hW states with ET(miss). The decays of a Higgs boson to a bottom-quark pair, to a photon pair, and to final states with leptons are considered in conjunction with hadronic and leptonic decay modes of the Z and W bosons. No evidence is found for supersymmetric particles, and 95% confidence level upper limits are evaluated for the respective pair production cross sections and for neutralino and chargino mass values.