Secondary lepton distributions as a probe of the top--higgs coupling at the LHC

Abstract

The differential distributions in rapidity and angles of the secondary lepton in the associated production of the top quark pair and higgs boson in proton-proton collisions at the LHC are quite sensitive to the top-higgs coupling. However, the effects of anomalous couplings of the most general t anti-t h interaction with operators of dimension-six that are clearly visible in the signal of the associated production of the top quark pair and higgs boson are to large extent obscured by the background sub-processes with the same final state. This means that analyses of such effects, in addition to higher order corrections that are usually calculated for the on-shell top quarks and higgs boson, should include their decays and possibly complete off resonance background contributions to the corresponding exclusive reactions.