Confirming the LHC Higgs Discovery with WW

Abstract

We investigate the prospects of observing a neutral Higgs boson decaying into a pair of $W$ bosons (one real and the other virtual), followed by the $W$ decays into $qq' \ell\nu$ or $jj\ell\nu$ at the CERN Large Hadron Collider (LHC). Assuming that the missing transverse energy comes solely from the neutrino in $W$ decay, we can reconstruct the $W$ masses and then the Higgs mass. At the LHC with a center of mass energy ($\sqrt{s}$) of 8 TeV and an integrated luminosity ($L$) of 25 fb$^{-1}$, we can potentially establish a $6\sigma$ signal. A $5\sigma$ discovery of $H \to WW^* \to jj\ell\nu$ for $\sqrt{s} = 14$ TeV can be achieved with $L = $ 6 fb$^{-1}$. The discovery of $H \to WW$ implies that the recently discovered new boson is a CP-even scalar if its spin is zero. In addition, this channel will provide a good opportunity to study the $HWW$ coupling.