Measurement of the cross section of top quark-antiquark pair production in association with a W boson in proton-proton collisions at $$ \sqrt{s} $$ = 13 TeV

Abstract

Abstract The production of a top quark-antiquark pair in association with a W boson ($$ \textrm{t}\overline{\textrm{t}}\textrm{W} $$<mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mi>t</mml:mi> <mml:mover> <mml:mi>t</mml:mi> <mml:mo>¯</mml:mo> </mml:mover> <mml:mi>W</mml:mi> </mml:math>) is measured in proton-proton collisions at a center-of-mass energy of 13 TeV. The analyzed data was recorded by the CMS experiment at the CERN LHC and corresponds to an integrated luminosity of 138 fb−1. Events with two or three leptons (electrons and muons) and additional jets are selected. In events with two leptons, a multiclass neural network is used to distinguish between the signal and background processes. Events with three leptons are categorized based on the number of jets and of jets originating from b quark hadronization, and the lepton charges. The inclusive $$ \textrm{t}\overline{\textrm{t}}\textrm{W} $$<mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mi>t</mml:mi> <mml:mover> <mml:mi>t</mml:mi> <mml:mo>¯</mml:mo> </mml:mover> <mml:mi>W</mml:mi> </mml:math> production cross section in the full phase space is measured to be 868 ± 40(stat) ± 51(syst) fb. The $$ \textrm{t}\overline{\textrm{t}}\textrm{W} $$<mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mi>t</mml:mi> <mml:mover> <mml:mi>t</mml:mi> <mml:mo>¯</mml:mo> </mml:mover> <mml:mi>W</mml:mi> </mml:math>+ and $$ \textrm{t}\overline{\textrm{t}}\textrm{W} $$<mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mi>t</mml:mi> <mml:mover> <mml:mi>t</mml:mi> <mml:mo>¯</mml:mo> </mml:mover> <mml:mi>W</mml:mi> </mml:math>− cross sections are also measured as 553 ± 30(stat) ± 30(syst) and 343 ± 26(stat) ± 25(syst) fb, respectively, and the corresponding ratio of the two cross sections is found to be $$ 1.61\pm 0.15{\left(\textrm{stat}\right)}_{-0.05}^{+0.07}\left(\textrm{syst}\right) $$<mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mn>1.61</mml:mn> <mml:mo>±</mml:mo> <mml:mn>0.15</mml:mn> <mml:msubsup> <mml:mfenced> <mml:mtext>stat</mml:mtext> </mml:mfenced> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>−</mml:mo> <mml:mn>0.05</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>+</mml:mo> <mml:mn>0.07</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> </mml:msubsup> <mml:mfenced> <mml:mtext>syst</mml:mtext> </mml:mfenced> </mml:math>. The measured cross sections are larger than but consistent with the standard model predictions within two standard deviations, and represent the most precise measurement of these cross sections to date.