Paper detail

Contributions of flavor violating couplings of a Higgs boson to $pp\to WW$

We study contributions to $pp\to W^+W^- \to \ellν_\ell \ell^\primeν_{\ell^\prime}$ in models with a new Higgs boson, $H$, and a neutral lepton, $ν_{4}$, with couplings $H-ν_{4}-ν_μ$ and $W-ν_{4}-μ$ through the process $pp \to H \to ν_4 ν_μ\to W μν_μ\to \ellν_\ell μν_μ$. Contrary to naive expectations, we find that contributions to $pp\to WW$ can be very large while satisfying constraints from standard $H\to WW$ and $H\toγγ$ searches. Even the excess observed by ATLAS in $pp\to WW$, if taken at face value, can be easily accommodated. The various kinematic distributions fit nicely the experimentally determined ones. This scenario can arise for example in a two Higgs doublet model with vectorlike leptons.