Pseudoscalar Higgs plus jet production at Next-to-Next-to-Leading Order in QCD

TL;DR

This paper calculates pseudoscalar Higgs production with a jet at NNLO in QCD, providing precise theoretical predictions for LHC phenomenology using effective field theory and advanced computational techniques.

Contribution

It presents the first NNLO QCD calculation of pseudoscalar Higgs plus jet production, including all relevant amplitudes and validation against scalar Higgs results.

Findings

Validated NNLO calculation with infrared regulation

Implementation into MCFM for phenomenological studies

Detailed analysis of pseudoscalar Higgs production at LHC

Abstract

We present a calculation of pseudoscalar Higgs production in association with a jet at Next-to-Next-to Leading Order (NNLO) accuracy in QCD. We work in an effective field theory in which $m_t \rightarrow \infty$ resulting in effective operators which couple the pseudoscalar to gluons and (massless) quarks. We have calculated all of the relevant amplitudes for the two-loop, one-loop and tree-level contributions. As a cross-check of our calculation we have re-calculated all of the scalar Higgs plus parton amplitudes and perform a detailed comparison to the literature. In order to regulate the infra-red singularities present at this order we employ the $N-$jettiness slicing method. In addition to a detailed validation of our calculation at this order we investigate LHC phenomenology for a selection of pseudoscalar Higgs masses. Our results are implemented into the parton-level Monte Carlo code MCFM.