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The Large Hadron Collider will allow studies of hard probes in nucleus-nucleus collisions which were not accessible at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider—even the study of small cross-section Z 0 -tagged jets becomes possible. Going beyond the measurement of back-to-back correlations of two strongly interacting particles to measure plasma properties, we replace one side by an electromagnetic probe which propagates through the plasma undisturbed and therefore provides a measurement of the energy of the initial hard scattering. We show that at sufficiently high transverse momentum the Z 0 -tagged jets originate predominately from the fragmentation of quarks and anti-quarks while gluon jets are suppressed. We propose to use lepton-pair tagged jets to study medium-induced partonic energy loss and to measure in-medium parton fragmentation functions to determine the opacity of the quark gluon plasma.

The Large Hadron Collider will allow studies of hard probes in nucleus-nucleus collisions which were not accessible at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider—even the study of small cross-section Z0-tagged jets becomes possible. Going beyond the measurement of back-to-back correlations of two strongly interacting particles to measure plasma properties, we replace one side by an electromagnetic probe which propagates through the plasma undisturbed and therefore provides a measurement of the energy of the initial hard scattering. We show that at sufficiently high transverse momentum the Z0-tagged jets originate predominately from the fragmentation of quarks and anti-quarks while gluon jets are suppressed. We propose to use lepton-pair tagged jets to study medium-induced partonic energy loss and to measure in-medium parton fragmentation functions to determine the opacity of the quark gluon plasma.

We present simulation studies of a possible jet measurement at LHC using the leptonic decay of a high transverse momentum virtual photon/Z0 in association with a quark/gluon jet. The interested production channels are q+q̄→Z0/γ*+g and g+q→Z0/γ*+q with the subsequent Z0/γ*→μ-+μ+ decay. The total energy of the jet is highly correlated to that of the dilepton coming from the Z0/γ* decay. The jet can be considered in this case as tagged (i.e. a dilepton-tag) with a known energy. Based on momentum balance between the dilepton (whose energy is not modified by the medium) and the jet (which does suffer energy loss in the medium), the angular correlation analysis that we plan to perform can shed light on the properties of the medium traversed (e.g. density) and parton fragmentation functions.

The Bc+/- to J/psi pi+/- and Bc+/- to J/psi pi+/- pi+/- pi-/+ decay modes are studied in proton-proton collisions at a center-of-mass energy of 7 TeV with the CMS detector at the LHC. The kinematic region investigated requires Bc+/- mesons with transverse momentum pt > 15 GeV and rapidity abs(y) < 1.6. The data sample corresponds to an integrated luminosity of 5.1 inverse femtobarns. The ratio of the branching fractions B(Bc+/- to J/psi pi+/- pi+/- pi-/+)/B(Bc+/- to J/psi pi+/-) is measured to be 2.55 +/- 0.80 (stat) +/- 0.33 (syst) +0.04/-0.01 (tau[Bc+]). The ratio of the production cross sections times branching fractions (sigma(Bc+) B(Bc+ to J/psi pi+))/ (sigma(B+) B(B+ to J/psi K+)) is determined to be [0.48 +/- 0.05 (stat) +/- 0.03 (syst) +/- 0.05 (tau_(B)c)]%

The purely electroweak (EW) cross section for the production of two jets in association with a Z boson, in proton-proton collisions at sqrt(s) = 8 TeV, is measured using data recorded by the CMS experiment at the CERN LHC, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 19.7 inverse femtobarns. The electroweak cross section for the lljj final state (with l = e or mu and j representing the quarks produced in the hard interaction) in the kinematic region defined by M[ll] > 50 GeV, M[jj] > 120 GeV, transverse momentum pt[j] > 25 GeV, and pseudorapidity abs(eta[j]) < 5, is found to be sigma[EW](lljj) = 174 +/- 15 (stat) +/- 40 (syst) fb, in agreement with the standard model prediction. The associated jet activity of the selected events is studied, in particular in a signal-enriched region of phase space, and the measurements are found to be in agreement with QCD predictions.

The normalised differential top quark-antiquark production cross section is measured as a function of the jet multiplicity in proton-proton collisions at a centre-of-mass energy of 7 TeV at the LHC with the CMS detector. The measurement is performed in both the dilepton and lepton+jets decay channels using data corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 5.0 inverse femtobarns. Using a procedure to associate jets to decay products of the top quarks, the differential cross section of the t t-bar production is determined as a function of the additional jet multiplicity in the lepton+jets channel. Furthermore, the fraction of events with no additional jets is measured in the dilepton channel, as a function of the threshold on the jet transverse momentum. The measurements are compared with predictions from perturbative quantum chromodynamics and no significant deviations are observed.

Transverse momentum spectra of charged particles are measured by the CMS experiment at the CERN LHC in pPb collisions at sqrt(s[NN]) =5.02 TeV, in the range 0.4 < pt < 120 GeVc and pseudorapidity abs(eta[CM]) < 1.8 in the proton-nucleon center-of-mass frame. For pt < 10 GeV, the charged-particle production is asymmetric about eta[CM] = 0, with smaller yield observed in the direction of the proton beam, qualitatively consistent with expectations from shadowing in nuclear parton distribution functions (nPDF). A pp reference spectrum at sqrt(s) = 5.02 TeV is obtained by interpolation from previous measurements at higher and lower center-of-mass energies. The pt distribution measured in pPb collisions shows an enhancement of charged particles with pt > 20 GeV compared to expectations from the pp reference. The enhancement is larger than predicted by perturbative quantum chromodynamic calculations that include antishadowing modifications of nPDFs.

Measurements of the ZZ production cross sections in proton-proton collisions at center-of-mass energies of 7 and 8 TeV are presented. Candidate events for the leptonic decay mode ZZ to 2 l 2 nu, where l denotes an electron or a muon, are reconstructed and selected from data corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 5.1 (19.6) inverse femtobarns at 7 (8) TeV collected with the CMS experiment. The measured cross sections, sigma(pp to ZZ) = 5.2 -1.4 +1.5 (stat) -1.1 +1.4 (syst) +/- 0.2 (lumi) pb at 7 TeV, and 6.9 -0.8 +0.8 (stat.) -1.4 +1.8 (syst) +/- 0.3 (lumi) pb at 8 TeV, are in good agreement with the standard model predictions with next-to-leading-order accuracy. The selected data are analyzed to search for anomalous triple gauge couplings involving the ZZ final state. In the absence of any deviation from the standard model predictions, limits are set on the relevant parameters. These limits are then combined with the previously published CMS results for ZZ in 4 l final states, yielding the most stringent constraints on the anomalous couplings.

Measurements are presented of the t-channel single-top-quark production cross section in proton-proton collisions at sqrt(s) = 8 TeV. The results are based on a data sample corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 19.7 inverse femtobarns recorded with the CMS detector at the LHC. The cross section is measured inclusively, as well as separately for top (t) and antitop (t-bar), in final states with a muon or an electron. The measured inclusive t-channel cross section is sigma[t-ch] = 83.6 +/- 2.3 (stat.) +/- 7.4 (syst.) pb. The single t and t-bar cross sections are measured to be sigma[t-ch,t] = 53.8 +/- 1.5 (stat.) +/- 4.4 (syst.) pb and sigma[t-ch,t-bar] = 27.6 +/- 1.3 (stat.)+/- 3.7 (syst.) pb, respectively. The measured ratio of cross sections is R[t-ch]=sigma[t-ch,t]/sigma[t-ch,t-bar]=1.95 +/- 0.10 (stat.) +/- 0.19 (syst.), in agreement with the standard model prediction. The modulus of the Cabibbo-Kobayashi-Maskawa matrix element Vtb is extracted and, in combination with a previous CMS result at sqrt(s) = 7 TeV, a value abs(Vtb) = 0.998 +/- 0.038 (exp.) +/- 0.016 (theo.) is obtained.