QCD and electroweak corrections to WZ scattering at the LHC

Abstract

We present the first computation of the full next-to-leading-order QCD and electroweak corrections to the WZ scattering process at the LHC. All off-shell, gauge-boson-decay, and interference effects are taken into account for the process pp → μ+μ−e+νej j + X at the orders O$$ \mathcal{O} $$(αsα6) and O$$ \mathcal{O} $$(α7). The electroweak corrections feature the typical Sudakov behaviour towards high energy and amount to −16% relative to the electroweak contribution to the integrated cross section. Moreover, the corrections induce significant shape distortions in differential distributions. The next-to-leading-order analysis of the quark- and gluon-induced channels is supplemented by a leading-order study of all possible contributions to the full 4ℓ + 2jets production cross section in a realistic fiducial phase-space volume.