Quenching of jets tagged with $W$ bosons in high-energy nuclear collisions

TL;DR

This paper presents the first detailed theoretical calculations of W+jet production in lead-lead collisions at the LHC, analyzing medium effects on various observables related to jet quenching.

Contribution

It combines NLO matrix element calculations with parton shower resummation and medium response modeling to predict nuclear modifications of W+jet observables in heavy-ion collisions.

Findings

Predicted significant medium modifications in Pb+Pb collisions

Provided detailed predictions for seven key observables

Highlighted the distinct nuclear effects on jet and W boson correlations

Abstract

We carry out the first detailed calculations of jet production associated with $W$ gauge bosons in Pb+Pb collisions at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). In our calculations, the production of $W$+jet in p+p collisions as a reference is obtained by Sherpa, which performs next-to-leading-order matrix element calculations matched to the resummation of parton shower simulations, while jet propagation and medium response in the quark-gluon plasma are simulated with the Linear Boltzmann Transport (LBT) model. We provide numerical predictions on seven observables of $W$+jet production with jet quenching in Pb+Pb collisions: the medium modification factor for the tagged jet cross sections $I_{AA}$, the distribution in invariant mass between the two leading jets in $N_{jets}\ge 2$ events $m_{jj}$, the missing $p_T$ or the vector sum of the lepton and jet transverse momentum $|\vec{p}_T^{Miss}|$, the summed scalar $p_T$ of all the jets in an event $S_T$, transverse momentum imbalance $x_{jW}$, average number of jets per $W$ boson $R_{jW}$, and azimuthal angle between the $W$ boson and jets $\Delta \phi_{jW}$. The distinct nuclear modifications of these seven observables in Pb+Pb relative to that in p+p collisions are presented with detailed discussions.