Measurement of the $W$-boson angular coefficients and transverse momentum in $pp$ collisions at $\sqrt{s}=13$ TeV with the ATLAS detector
The ATLAS Collaboration
Published: 2025/9/17
Abstract
The angular distributions of Drell-Yan lepton pairs provide sensitive probes of the underlying dynamics of quantum chromodynamics (QCD) effects in vector-boson production. This paper presents for the first time the measurement of the full set of angular coefficients together with the differential cross-section as a function of the transverse momentum of the $W$ boson, in the full phase space of the decay leptons. The measurements are performed separately for the $W^-$ and $W^+$ channels. The analysis uses proton-proton collision data recorded by the ATLAS experiment at the Large Hadron Collider in 2017 and 2018, during special low-luminosity runs with a reduced number of interactions per bunch crossings (pile-up). The data correspond to an integrated luminosity of $338$ pb$^{-1}$ at a centre-of-mass energy of $\sqrt{s} = 13$ TeV. The low pile-up conditions enable an optimised reconstruction of the $W$ boson transverse momentum. All results agree with theory predictions incorporating finite-order QCD corrections up to next-to-next-to-leading-order in the strong coupling constant, $\alpha_S$.