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$gg \to ZH$ : updated predictions at NLO QCD
by 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
Submission summary
| Authors (as registered SciPost users): | Gudrun Heinrich · Marco Vitti |
| Submission information | |
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| Preprint Link: | https://arxiv.org/abs/2508.09905v2 (pdf) |
| Date submitted: | Nov. 20, 2025, 11:04 a.m. |
| Submitted by: | Marco Vitti |
| Submitted to: | SciPost Physics Community Reports |
| for consideration in Collection: |
| Ontological classification | |
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| Academic field: | Physics |
| Specialties: |
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Abstract
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.
Author comments upon resubmission
The referee requested a more prominent account of the interplay of the gluon-initated channel with the Drell-Yan-like contribution. We addressed the request as described in the list of changes below.
List of changes
• We added a sentence at the end of the Introduction, in which we mention that
the Drell-Yan-like and the gluon-initiated contributions cannot be formally treated as independent, and referring
to a discussion in Subsection 2.2.
• We added a paragraph at the beginning of Subsection 2.2, where we state (as
correctly pointed out by the referee) that real-emission diagrams that we included
in our O($\alpha_s^3$ ) corrections can interfere with Drell-Yan-like diagrams at O($\alpha_s^2$ ).
• We added a sentence at the end of Subsection 3.1, stating that our choice of
central scales for the evaluation of the gluon-initiated contribution does not take
into account correlations of scale uncertainties due to the interplay of the gluon-
initiated and Drell-Yan-like channels. However, we assume these effects to be of
higher order.
the Drell-Yan-like and the gluon-initiated contributions cannot be formally treated as independent, and referring
to a discussion in Subsection 2.2.
• We added a paragraph at the beginning of Subsection 2.2, where we state (as
correctly pointed out by the referee) that real-emission diagrams that we included
in our O($\alpha_s^3$ ) corrections can interfere with Drell-Yan-like diagrams at O($\alpha_s^2$ ).
• We added a sentence at the end of Subsection 3.1, stating that our choice of
central scales for the evaluation of the gluon-initiated contribution does not take
into account correlations of scale uncertainties due to the interplay of the gluon-
initiated and Drell-Yan-like channels. However, we assume these effects to be of
higher order.
Current status:
In refereeing