Measurement Of The Top Pair Production Cross Section In 8 Tev Proton Proton Collisions Using Kinematic Information In The Lepton Jets Final State With Atlas

Spin Correlations in tt Events from pp Collisions

This thesis introduces readers to the Standard Model, the top quark and its properties, before explaining the concept of spin correlation measurement. The first measurement of top quark spin correlations at the LHC in the lepton+jets decay channel is presented. As the heaviest elementary particle, the top quark plays an essential role in the Standard Model of elementary particle physics. In the case of top quarks being produced in pairs at hadron colliders, the Standard Model predicts their spins to be correlated. The degree of correlation depends on both the production mechanism and properties of the top quark. Any deviation from the Standard Model prediction can be an indicator for new physics phenomena. The thesis employs an advanced top quark reconstruction algorithm including dedicated identification of the up- and down-type quarks from the W boson decay.

Top Quark Pair Production

Before any kind of new physics discovery could be made at the LHC, a precise understanding and measurement of the Standard Model of particle physics' processes was necessary. The book provides an introduction to top quark production in the context of the Standard Model and presents two such precise measurements of the production of top quark pairs in proton-proton collisions at a center-of-mass energy of 7 TeV that were observed with the ATLAS Experiment at the LHC. The presented measurements focus on events with one charged lepton, missing transverse energy and jets. Using novel and advanced analysis techniques as well as a good understanding of the detector, they constitute the most precise measurements of the quantity at that time.

Measurement of the Top Pair Production Cross Section in 8 TeV Proton-proton Collisions Using Kinematic Information in the Lepton Plus Jets Final State with ATLAS.