Measurement of quantum correlations in the WZ system at the LHC
The study of heavy vector bosons has been fundamental both for the understanding and testing the prediction of the Standard Model and for exploring the potential existence of new physics. In recent years, a new approach to study particle physics is quickly developing using quantum information principle and inspired observables to investigate relations between particles created at colliders. In this thesis, it has been analyzed the bipartite qutrit system resulting from the process $pp \\rightarrow W^{\\pm}Z$, where the produced bosons decay into leptonic final states. The spin density matrix of the process has been derived by applying a quantum tomography approach to the simulated final state. This procedure allows to derive information on the heavy bosons' spin by exploiting the angular distribution of the decay products. The key measurement in this thesis is the lower bound of the concurrence, which is a quantum observable sensitive to the entanglement between the $WZ$ spin. During the analysis, realistic selections and reconstruction procedures have been included to estimate the realistic effects that will affect such measurement performed in collider experiments. Moreover, a dedicated statistical analysis is employed to recover the observable of interest and estimate the corresponding statistical uncertainties expected to be achievable at the LHC. The analysis results indicate that measuring entanglement between the $W$ and $Z$ bosons is feasible, though it would be highly challenging with the current Run 3 dataset.
Publication Details
- Journal
- AMS Degree Thesis (University of Bologna)
- Published
- 2024-09-20
- Primary Topic
- Particle physics theoretical and experimental studies
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 0.00