Measurement of the ratio of the pp → W+c-jet cross section to the inclusive p¯p → W+jets cross section

Authors

V. M. Abazov, Joint Institute for Nuclear Research, Dubna, Russia
Kenneth A. Bloom, University of Nebraska-LincolnFollow
Gregory Snow, University of Nebraska-LincolnFollow
D0 Collaboration

Date of this Version

June 2008

Comments

Published in Physics Letters B (2008), doi: 10.1016/j.physletb.2008.06.067.

Abstract

We present a measurement of the fraction of inclusive W+jets events produced with net charm quantum number ±1, denoted W+c-jet, in pp collisions at √s = 1.96 TeV using approximately 1 fb^-1 of data collected by the D0 detector at the Fermilab Tevatron Collider. We identify the W+jets events via the leptonic W boson decays. Candidate W+c-jet events are selected by requiring a jet containing a muon in association with a reconstructed W boson and exploiting the charge correlation between this muon and W boson decay lepton to perform a nearly model-independent background subtraction. We measure the fraction of W+c-jet events in the inclusive W+jets sample for jet pT > 20 GeV and pseudorapidity |η| < 2.5 to be 0.074±0.019(stat.)±^0.012 _0.014 (syst.), in agreement with theoretical predictions. The probability that background fluctuations could produce the observed fraction of W+c-jet events is estimated to be 2.5 × 10^-4, which corresponds to a 3.5 σ statistical significance.