Measurement of the W Boson Mass with the Collider Detector at Fermilab

TL;DR

This paper reports a precise measurement of the W boson mass using collider data from Fermilab, combining electron and muon decay channels to improve accuracy and contribute to testing the Standard Model.

Contribution

First measurement of the W boson mass using data from Fermilab's Tevatron with combined electron and muon channels, achieving improved precision over previous results.

Findings

Measured W boson mass as 80.470 ± 0.089 GeV/c^2

Combined with previous data, W mass is 80.433 ± 0.079 GeV/c^2

Systematic uncertainties dominated by energy and momentum scale calibrations

Abstract

We present a measurement of the W boson mass using data collected with the CDF detector during the 1994-95 collider run at the Fermilab Tevatron. A fit to the transverse mass spectrum of a sample of 30,115 W -> enu events recorded in an integrated luminosity of 84 pb^(-1) gives a mass Mw = 80.473 +- 0.065(stat.) +- 0.092(syst.) GeV/c^2. A fit to the transverse mass spectrum of a sample of 14,740 W -> munu events from 80 pb^(-1) gives a mass Mw = 80.465 +- 0.100(stat.) +- 0.103(syst.) GeV/c^2. The dominant contributions to the systematic uncertainties are the uncertainties in the electron energy scale and the muon momentum scale, 0.075 GeV/c^2 and 0.085 GeV/c^2, respectively. The combined value for the electron and muon channel is Mw = 80.470 +- 0.089 GeV/c^2. When combined with previously published CDF measurements, we obtain Mw = 80.433 +- 0.079 GeV/c^2.