Confronting same-sign W-boson production with parton correlations

Abstract

Abstract The future runs of LHC offer a unique opportunity to measure correlations between two partons inside the proton, which have never been experimentally detected. The process of interest is the production of two positively charged W-bosons decaying in the muon channel. We present a detailed analysis of proton-proton collisions at $$ \sqrt{s} $$ s = 13 TeV, where we combine Monte Carlo event generators with our calculations of parton correlations. We carefully compare double parton scattering to relevant background processes and trace a path towards a clean signal sample. Several observables are constructed to demonstrate the effect of parton correlations with respect to clear benchmark values for uncorrelated scatterings. We find that especially spin correlations can be responsible for large effects in the variables we study, because of their direct relation with the parton angular momentum and, therefore, the directions of the muon momenta. We estimate the significance of the measurements as a function of the integrated luminosity and conclude that the LHC has the potential to detect, or put strong limits on, parton correlations in the near future.