Precision Phenomenology for LHC Run II: The Standard Model and Beyond

This award funds the research activities of Professor Ciaran Williams at the State University of New York, University at Buffalo. The newly upgraded Large Hadron Collider (LHC) represents one of mankind's most technologically advanced and scientifically ambitious projects. By colliding elementary particles against each other at high energies at the LHC, physicists expect to learn about the fundamental building blocks of matter and their interactions at higher energies and smaller distances than have ever been previously explored. The LHC has just begun its second extended data-taking period (Run II), and it is hard to envisage a more exciting time in particle physics. Run II will test whether the recently discovered Higgs boson is fully consistent with our current expectations, or whether it behaves in ways that transcend our best current theories. Another primary aim of the LHC program is to seek a microscopic theory of Dark Matter, which is currently poorly understood, and to understand whether there exist any interactions of Dark Matter with more traditional kinds of matter. Research in this area thus advances the national interest by promoting the progress of science in one of its most fundamental directions: the discovery and understanding of new physical laws. All of these analyses require precise theoretical predictions in order to extract useful information from the data, and Professor Williams will carry out detailed analyses along these lines. Specifically, Professor Williams will perform new calculations using recently developed methods, which will result in a much smaller theoretical uncertainty than those which have previously been used. The results of his calculations will be released publicly to experimental (and theoretical) users and will be utilized in experimental analyses. More technically, Professor Williams will perform cutting edge calculations at Next-to-Next-to Leading Order accuracy and implement these results into a publicly available computer code, MCFM. The primary focus will be key LHC processes such as diboson production and those related to studies of the Higgs boson. Beyond the Standard Model (BSM) effects will be included, typically in the form of anomalous couplings, allowing for applications in experimental analyses. Prof Williams will also calculate the mixed QCD-EW corrections to vector boson production, and implement the results into MCFM, allowing for an improved measurement of the W boson mass, a crucial parameter in testing the overall consistency of the Standard Model and thereby constraining the possible new physics beyond.