Gluon-induced weak boson fusion

Abstract

The gluon-gluon induced terms for Higgs production through weak boson fusion (WBF) are computed. Formally, these are of next-to-next-to-leading order in the strong coupling constant. This is the lowest order at which nonzero color exchange occurs between the scattering quarks, leading to a color field and thus additional hadronic activity between the outgoing jets. Using a minimal set of cuts, the numerical impact of these terms is at the percent level with respect to the next-to-leading order rate for weak boson fusion. Applying the so-called WBF cuts leads to an even stronger suppression, so that we do not expect a significant deterioration of the WBF signal by these color exchange effects.