Combination of the W boson polarization measurements in top quark decays using ATLAS and CMS data at $\sqrt{s} =$ 8 TeV
The combination of measurements of the W boson polarization in top quark decays performed by the ATLAS and CMS collaborations is presented. The measurements are based on proton-proton collision data produced at the LHC at a centre-of-mass energy of 8 TeV, and corresponding to an integrated luminosity of about 20 fb$^{−1}$ for each experiment. The measurements used events containing one lepton and having different jet multiplicities in the final state. The results are quoted as fractions of W bosons with longitudinal (F$_{0}$), left-handed (F$_{L}$), or right-handed (F$_{R}$) polarizations. The resulting combined measurements of the polarization fractions are F$_{0}$ = 0.693 ± 0.014 and F$_{L}$ = 0.315 ± 0.011. The fraction F$_{R}$ is calculated from the unitarity constraint to be F$_{R}$ = −0.008 ± 0.007. These results are in agreement with the standard model predictions at next-to-next-to-leading order in perturbative quantum chromodynamics and represent an improvement in precision of 25 (29)% for F$_{0}$ (F$_{L}$) with respect to the most precise single measurement. A limit on anomalous right-handed vector (V$_{R}$), and left- and right-handed tensor (g$_{L}$, g$_{R}$) tWb couplings is set while fixing all others to their standard model values. The allowed regions are [−0.11, 0.16] for V$_{R}$, [−0.08, 0.05] for g$_{L}$, and [−0.04, 0.02] for g$_{R}$, at 95% confidence level. Limits on the corresponding Wilson coefficients are also derived.[graphic not available: see fulltext]