How relevant are top loops in VBS at the LHC?

TL;DR

This paper evaluates the significance of top and bottom quark loop contributions to W+W- elastic scattering in the HEFT framework, highlighting their potential importance compared to boson loops.

Contribution

It provides a detailed comparison of fermion and boson loop contributions to the imaginary part of W+W- scattering within HEFT, emphasizing the relevance of fermion effects.

Findings

Fermion loops can significantly impact the imaginary part of W+W- scattering.

Comparison shows fermion contributions may be comparable to boson loops.

Neglected fermion loops could influence interpretations of LHC data.

Abstract

We present the contributions to the imaginary part of the $W^+W^-$ elastic scattering from top and bottom quark one-loop diagrams. The computation is performed within the context of HEFT, where we compare them with the boson-loop corrections. We argue that the often neglected (top and bottom) fermion contributions may in fact be relevant.