Measurement of the Higgs boson production via vector boson fusion and its decay into bottom quarks in proton-proton collisions at $\sqrt{s}$ = 13 TeV

TL;DR

This paper reports a measurement of Higgs boson production via vector boson fusion and its decay into bottom quarks at 13 TeV, observing signals consistent with the Standard Model within uncertainties.

Contribution

First measurement of VBF Higgs to bottom quarks at 13 TeV with observed significance near 2.4 standard deviations.

Findings

VBF Higgs signal strength close to SM prediction

Observed significance of 2.4 standard deviations for VBF process

Inclusive Higgs to bottom quarks signal strength consistent with SM

Abstract

A measurement of the Higgs boson (H) production via vector boson fusion (VBF) and its decay into a bottom quark-antiquark pair ($\mathrm{b\bar{b}}$) is presented using proton-proton collision data recorded by the CMS experiment at $\sqrt{s}$ = 13 TeV and corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 90.8 fb$^{-1}$. Treating the gluon-gluon fusion process as a background and constraining its rate to the value expected in the standard model (SM) within uncertainties, the signal strength of the VBF process, defined as the ratio of the observed signal rate to that predicted by the SM, is measured to be $\mu^\text{qqH}_\mathrm{Hb\bar{b}}$ = 1.01 $^{+0.55}_{-0.46}$. The VBF signal is observed with a significance of 2.4 standard deviations relative to the background prediction, while the expected significance is 2.7 standard deviations. Considering inclusive Higgs boson production and decay into bottom quarks, the signal strength is measured to be $\mu^\text{incl.}_\mathrm{Hb\bar{b}}$ = 0.99 $^{+0.48}_{-0.41}$, corresponding to an observed (expected) significance of 2.6 (2.9) standard deviations.