Measuring the Higgs boson's parity using tau --> rho nu

Abstract

We present a very promising method for a measurement of the Higgs boson parity using the H/A -> tau^+ tau^- --> rho^+ nu rho^- nu --> pi^+ pi^0 nu pi^- pi^0 nu decay chain. The method is both model independent and independent of the Higgs production mechanism. Angular distributions of the tau decay products which are sensitive to the Higgs boson parity are defined and are found to be measurable using typical properties of a future detector for an e^+ e^- linear collider. The prospects for the measurement of the parity of a Higgs boson with a mass of 120 GeV are quantified for the case of e^+ e^- collisons of 500 GeV center of mass energy with an integrated luminosity of 500 fb^-1. The Standard Model Higgsstrahlung production process is used as an example.