QCD Corrections to Higgs Pair Production in Bottom Quark Fusion

Abstract

We present a complete next-to-leading order (NLO) calculation for the total cross section of inclusive Higgs pair production via bottom-quark fusion ($b\bar{b} \to hh$) at the CERN Large Hadron Collider (LHC) in the Standard Model. The NLO QCD corrections lead to less dependence on the renormalization scale ($\mu_R$) and the factorization scale ($\mu_F$) than the leading-order (LO) cross section, and they significantly increase the LO cross section. The rate for inclusive Higgs pair production is small in the Standard Model, but can be large in models with enhanced couplings of the $b$ quark to the Higgs bosons.