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SciPost Physics Community Reports

$gg \to ZH$: Updated predictions at NLO QCD

Benjamin Campillo Aveleira, Long Chen, Joshua Davies, Giuseppe Degrassi, Pier Paolo Giardino, Ramona Gröber, Gudrun Heinrich, Stephen Jones, Matthias Kerner, Johannes Schlenk, Matthias Steinhauser, Marco Vitti

SciPost Phys. Comm. Rep. 16 (2026) · published 13 January 2026 | · pdf

We present state-of-the-art predictions for the inclusive cross section of gluon-initiated $ZH$ production, following the recommendations of the LHC Higgs Working Group. In particular, we include NLO QCD corrections, where the virtual corrections are obtained from the combination of a forward expansion and a high-energy expansion, and the real corrections are exact. The expanded results for the virtual corrections are compared in detail to full numerical results. The updated predictions show a reduction of the scale uncertainties to the level of 15%, and they include an estimate of the top-mass-scheme uncertainty.
Simplified template cross sections – Stage 1.1 and 1.2

Nicolas Berger, Claudia Bertella, Matteo Bonanomi, Nihal Brahimi, Thomas P. Calvet, Milene Calvetti, Valerio Dao, Marco Delmastro, Michael Duehrssen-Debling, Paolo Francavilla, Yacine Haddad, Sarah Heim, Jelena Jovicevic, Oleh Kivernyk, Maria Moreno Llacer, Jonathon M. Langford, Changqiao Li, Giovanni Marchiori, Josh A. McFayden, Johannes K. L. Michel, Predrag Milenovic, Carlo E. Pandini, Edward Scott, Frank J. Tackmann, Kerstin Tackmann, Lorenzo Viliani, Meng Xiao, Hongtao Yang

SciPost Phys. Comm. Rep. 15 (2026) · published 7 January 2026 | · pdf

Simplified Template Cross Sections (STXS) have been adopted by the LHC experiments as a common framework for Higgs measurements. Their purpose is to reduce the theoretical uncertainties that are directly folded into the measurements as much as possible, while at the same time allowing for the combination of the measurements between different decay channels as well as between experiments. We report the complete, revised definition of the STXS kinematic bins (stage 1.1 and stage 1.2), which have been used for the measurements by the ATLAS and CMS experiments using the full LHC Run 2 datasets. The main focus is on the four dominant Higgs production processes, namely gluon-fusion, vector-boson fusion, production in association with a vector boson and in association with a $t\bar t$ pair. We also comment briefly on the treatment of other production modes.
Threshold improved $Z H$ production at the LHC

Goutam Das, Chinmoy Dey, Meduri C. Kumar, Kajal Samanta

SciPost Phys. Comm. Rep. 14 (2025) · published 1 December 2025 | · pdf

We present precise theoretical results for the $ZH$ production cross section and invariant mass distribution at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) taking into account the effects of soft gluons. We improve both quark-initiated and gluon-initiated subprocesses through threshold resummation within the QCD framework and present combined results relevant for $13.6$ TeV LHC.
Higgs production via vector-boson fusion at the LHC

Gaetano Barone, Jiayi Chen, Stephane Cooperstein, Nikita Dolganov, Silvia Ferrario Ravasio, Yacine Haddad, Stefan Höche, Barbara Jäger, Alexander Karlberg, Alexander Mück, Mathieu Pellen, Christian T. Preuss, Daniel Reichelt, Simon Reinhardt, Marco Zaro

SciPost Phys. Comm. Rep. 13 (2025) · published 5 November 2025 | · pdf

In this article, we summarise the recent experimental measurements and theoretical work on Higgs boson production via vector-boson fusion at the LHC. Along with this, we provide state-of-the-art predictions at fixed order as well as with parton-shower corrections within the Standard Model at $13.6\,\text{TeV}$. The results are presented in the form of multi-differential distributions as well as in the Simplified Template Cross Section bins. All materials and outputs of this study are available on public repositories. Finally, following findings in the literature, recommendations are made to estimate theoretical uncertainties related to parton-shower corrections.
Theoretical modeling of QCD radiation in off-shell Higgs production through gluon fusion

Rafael Coelho Lopes de Sá, Martina Javurkova, Matteo Lazzeretti, Raoul Röntsch

SciPost Phys. Comm. Rep. 12 (2025) · published 4 September 2025 | · pdf

The measurement of the Higgs boson width is a critical test of the Standard Model, with significant implications for understanding electroweak symmetry breaking. Direct measurements are limited by detector resolution, but it can be measured with greater precision through a combined analysis of on-shell and off-shell Higgs boson production. While results for on-shell production have been computed to a very high accuracy, theoretical predictions for off-shell Higgs boson production are not as well controlled due to the breakdown of the heavy-top approximation and the large interference with non-resonant amplitudes. Seeking to understand and improve the theoretical control, we compare leading-order and next-to-leading-order plus parton shower differential cross-sections for signal, background, and full physical processes in off-shell Higgs boson production at the Large Hadron Collider, using Powheg, MadGraph, and Sherpa. We analyze the impact of higher-order quantum chromodynamics effects and theoretical uncertainties, highlighting differences between predictions using jet merging with parton showers, and those from next-to-leading order computations matched to parton showers. The results provide insights for improving theoretical predictions and their application to experimental measurements in the future.

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Physics: High-Energy Physics - Phenomenology

The inclusive Higgs boson cross-section in gluon-gluon fusion in soft-virtual approximation at fourth order in QCD

by Goutam Das, Sven-Olaf Moch

Version 1 (latest version)
Submitted Dec. 15, 2025, 5:02 p.m. to SciPost Physics Community Reports · latest activity: Dec. 27, 2025, 2:04 p.m.
Physics: High-Energy Physics - Phenomenology

Modelling $b\bar b H$ production for the LHC at 13.6 TeV

by Christian Biello, Alessandro Gavardi, Rebecca von Kuk, Matthew A. Lim, Stefano Manzoni, Elena Mazzeo, Javier Mazzitelli, Aparna Sankar, Michael Spira, Frank J. Tackmann, Marius Wiesemann, Giulia Zanderighi, Marco Zaro

Version 1 (latest version)
Submitted Oct. 31, 2025, 6:37 p.m. to SciPost Physics Community Reports · latest activity: Jan. 6, 2026, 10:31 a.m.

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LHC Higgs Working Group Reports

Snowmass white paper: The cosmological bootstrap

Daniel Baumann, Daniel Green, Austin Joyce, Enrico Pajer, Guilherme L. Pimentel, Charlotte Sleight, Massimo Taronna

SciPost Phys. Comm. Rep. 1 (2024) · published 23 July 2024 | · pdf

This white paper summarizes recent progress in the cosmological bootstrap, an approach to the study of the statistics of primordial fluctuations from consistency with unitarity, locality and symmetry assumptions. We review the key ideas of the bootstrap method, with an eye towards future directions and ambitions of the program. Focusing on recent progress involving de Sitter and quasi-de Sitter backgrounds, we highlight the role of singularities and unitarity in constraining the form of the correlators. We also discuss nonperturbative formulations of the bootstrap, connections to anti-de Sitter space, and potential implications for holography.

37 citations
Possible causes of false general relativity violations in gravitational wave observations

Anuradha Gupta, K. G. Arun, Enrico Barausse, Laura Bernard, Emanuele Berti, Sajad A. Bhat, Alessandra Buonanno, Vitor Cardoso, Shun Yin Cheung, Teagan A. Clarke, Sayantani Datta, Arnab Dhani, Jose María Ezquiaga, Ish Gupta, Nir Guttman, Tanja Hinderer, Qian Hu, Justin Janquart, Nathan K. Johnson-McDaniel, Rahul Kashyap, N. V. Krishnendu, Paul D. Lasky, Andrew Lundgren, Elisa Maggio, Parthapratim Mahapatra, Andrea Maselli, Purnima Narayan, Alex B. Nielsen, Laura K. Nuttall, Paolo Pani, Lachlan Passenger, Ethan Payne, Lorenzo Pompili, Luca Reali, Pankaj Saini, Anuradha Samajdar, Shubhanshu Tiwari, Hui Tong, Chris Van Den Broeck, Kent Yagi, Huan Yang, Nicolás Yunes, B. S. Sathyaprakash

SciPost Phys. Comm. Rep. 5 (2025) · published 13 February 2025 | · pdf

General relativity (GR) has proven to be a highly successful theory of gravity since its inception. The theory has thrivingly passed numerous experimental tests, predominantly in weak gravity, low relative speeds, and linear regimes, but also in the strong-field and very low-speed regimes with binary pulsars. Observable gravitational waves (GWs) originate from regions of spacetime where gravity is extremely strong, making them a unique tool for testing GR, in previously inaccessible regions of large curvature, relativistic speeds, and strong gravity. Since their first detection, GWs have been extensively used to test GR, but no deviations have been found so far. Given GR's tremendous success in explaining current astronomical observations and laboratory experiments, accepting any deviation from it requires a very high level of statistical confidence and consistency of the deviation across GW sources. In this paper, we compile a comprehensive list of potential causes that can lead to a false identification of a GR violation in standard tests of GR on data from current and future ground-based GW detectors. These causes include detector noise, signal overlaps, gaps in the data, detector calibration, source model inaccuracy, missing physics in the source and in the underlying environment model, source misidentification, and mismodeling of the astrophysical population. We also provide a rough estimate of when each of these causes will become important for tests of GR for different detector sensitivities. We argue that each of these causes should be thoroughly investigated, quantified, and ruled out before claiming a GR violation in GW observations.

29 citations
Effective field theory descriptions of Higgs boson pair production

Lina Alasfar, Luca Cadamuro, Christina Dimitriadi, Arnaud Ferrari, Ramona Gröber, Gudrun Heinrich, Tom Ingebretsen Carlson, Jannis Lang, Serhat Ördek, Laura Pereira Sánchez, Ludovic Scyboz, Jörgen Sjölin

SciPost Phys. Comm. Rep. 2 (2024) · published 16 October 2024 | · pdf

Higgs boson pair production is traditionally considered to be of particular interest for a measurement of the trilinear Higgs self-coupling. Yet it can offer insights into other couplings as well, since -- in an effective field theory (EFT) parameterisation of potential new physics -- both the production cross section and kinematical properties of the Higgs boson pair depend on various other Wilson coefficients of EFT operators. This note summarises the ongoing efforts related to the development of EFT tools for Higgs boson pair production in gluon fusion, and provides recommendations for the use of distinct EFT parameterisations in the Higgs boson pair production process. This document also outlines where further efforts are needed and provides a detailed analysis of theoretical uncertainties. Additionally, benchmark scenarios are updated. We also re-derive a parameterisation of the next-to-leading order (NLO) QCD corrections in terms of the EFT Wilson coefficients both for the total cross section and the distribution in the invariant mass of the Higgs boson pair, providing for the first time also the covariance matrix. A reweighting procedure making use of the newly derived coefficients is validated, which can be used to significantly speed up experimental analyses.

11 citations
Radiative corrections and Monte Carlo tools for low-energy hadronic cross sections in $e^+ e^-$ collisions

Riccardo Aliberti, Paolo Beltrame, Ettore Budassi, Carlo M. Carloni Calame, Gilberto Colangelo, Lorenzo Cotrozzi, Achim Denig, Anna Driutti, Tim Engel, Lois Flower, Andrea Gurgone, Martin Hoferichter, Fedor Ignatov, Sophie Kollatzsch, Bastian Kubis, Andrzej Kupść, Fabian Lange, Alberto Lusiani, Stefan E. Müller, Jérémy Paltrinieri, Pau Petit Rosàs, Fulvio Piccinini, Alan Price, Lorenzo Punzi, Marco Rocco, Olga Shekhovtsova, Andrzej Siódmok, Adrian Signer, Giovanni Stagnitto, Peter Stoffer, Thomas Teubner, William J. Torres Bobadilla, Francesco P. Ucci, Yannick Ulrich, Graziano Venanzoni

SciPost Phys. Comm. Rep. 9 (2025) · published 25 June 2025 | · pdf

We present the results of Phase I of an ongoing review of Monte Carlo tools relevant for low-energy hadronic cross sections. This includes a detailed comparison of Monte Carlo codes for electron–positron scattering into a muon pair, pion pair, and electron pair, for scan and radiative-return experiments. After discussing the various approaches that are used and effects that are included, we show differential cross sections obtained with AfkQed, BabaYaga@NLO, KKMC, MCGPJ, McMule, Phokhara, and Sherpa, for scenarios that are inspired by experiments providing input for the dispersive evaluation of the hadronic vacuum polarisation.

5 citations
Les Houches guide to reusable ML models in LHC analyses

Jack Y. Araz, Andy Buckley, Gregor Kasieczka, Jan Kieseler, Sabine Kraml, Anders Kvellestad, Andre Lessa, Tomasz Procter, Are Raklev, Humberto Reyes-Gonzalez, Krzysztof Rolbiecki, Sezen Sekmen, Gokhan Unel

SciPost Phys. Comm. Rep. 3 (2024) · published 6 November 2024 | · pdf

With the increasing usage of machine-learning in high-energy physics analyses, the publication of the trained models in a reusable form has become a crucial question for analysis preservation and reuse. The complexity of these models creates practical issues for both reporting them accurately and for ensuring the stability of their behaviours in different environments and over extended timescales. In this note we discuss the current state of affairs, highlighting specific practical issues and focusing on the most promising technical and strategic approaches to ensure trustworthy analysis-preservation. This material originated from discussions in the LHC Reinterpretation Forum and the 2023 PhysTeV workshop at Les Houches.

3 citations

Physics: High-Energy Physics - Phenomenology

Physics: High-Energy Physics - Phenomenology

Series contained in this Journal

37 citations

29 citations

11 citations

5 citations

3 citations