Higgs‐Boson Production in Association with Heavy Quarks
Associated production of a Higgs boson with a heavy, i.e. top or bottom, quark‐anti‐quark pair provide observation channels for Higgs bosons at the LHC which can be used to measure the respective Yukawa couplings. For the light supersymmetric Higgs boson we present SUSY‐QCD corrections at the one‐loop level, which constitute a significant contribution to the cross section.

title: Physics beyond the standard model: supersymmetry
abstract: This collection of studies on new physics at the LHC constitutes the report of the supersymmetry working group at the Workshop 'Physics at TeV Colliders', Les Houches, France, 2007. They cover the wide spectrum of phenomenology in the LHC era, from alternative models and signatures to the extraction of relevant observables, the study of the MSSM parameter space and finally to the interplay of LHC observations with additional data expected on a similar time scale. The special feature of this collection is that while not each of the studies is explicitly performed together by theoretical and experimental LHC physicists, all of them were inspired by and discussed in this particular environment.

title: NLO QCD corrections to $W^\pm Z\gamma$ production with leptonic decays
abstract: We present a computation of the O(alpha_s) QCD corrections to W^\pm Z \gamma production at the Large Hadron Collider. The photon is considered as real, and we include full leptonic decays for the W and Z bosons. Based on the structure of the VBFNLO program package, we obtain numerical results through a fully flexible Monte Carlo program, which allows to implement general cuts and distributions of the final-state particles. The NLO QCD corrections are sizable and strongly exceed the theory error obtained by a scale variation of the leading-order result. Also, the shapes of relevant observables are significantly altered.

title: Complete one-loop calculation of the T-violating D-parameter in neutron decay in the MSSM
abstract: We investigate the violation of time reversal invariance in the decay of the free neutron in the framework of the minimal supersymmetric standard model (MSSM). The coefficient of the triple product of the neutron spin and the momenta of electron and neutrino, the so-called D parameter, is computed at one-loop order including all diagrams. We find that D is mainly sensitive to the trilinear A coupling in the squark sector and to the phase of the coefficient $\mu$ which mixes the two Higgs superfields. The maximal MSSM contribution using parameters still allowed by experiment is however at $D \approx 10^{-7}$, while QED final state interactions give a value of $D_{\mathrm {fsi}} = - 2.3 \cdot 10^{-5}$. Explicit expressions for all relevant diagrams are given in an appendix.

title: Helmholtz Alliance Linear Collider Forum
abstract: Supersymmetric scenarios with a very weakly interacting lightest superpartner (LSP) - like the gravitino or axino - naturally give rise to a long-lived next-to-LSP (NLSP). If the NLSP is a charged slepton it leaves a very distinct signature in a collider experiment. At the ILC/CLIC it will be possible to capture a significant fraction of the produced charged sleptons and observe their decays. These decays potentially reveal the nature of the LSP and thus provide a unique possibility to measure the properties of a very weakly interacting LSP which otherwise is most likely hidden from any other observation, like direct or indirect dark matter searches. We review the proposals that have been made to measure the LSP properties at the ILC/CLIC and compare its potential to the capability of the LHC.

title: Di-boson and Tri-boson production at the LHC
abstract: The status of di-boson and tri-boson production is shortly review. Using the VBFNLO and the LOOPSIM package, approximated results at NNLO QCD are given for WZ production. Results for waa + jet at NLO QCD are also shown.

title: New Statistical Measures of the Lya Forest Spectra for Accurate Comparison to Theoretical Models
abstract: We propose a new method of analysis for the \lya forest, namely to measure the 1-point and 2-point joint probability distribution of the transmitted flux. The results for a sample of seven observed quasars and from two simulations of structure formation are shown and compared. Statistically significant differences in the 2-point function between the results of the numerical simulations and the observations are easily found. The analysis we suggest is very simple to apply to observed data sets, and we discuss its superiority over the traditional Voigt-profile fitting algorithms for accurate comparison to the predictions of theoretical models.

title: Small-Scale Structure at High Redshift. IV. Low-Ionization Gas Intersecting Three Lines of Sight to Q2237+0305*
abstract: We have obtained Keck HIRES spectra of three images of the quadruply gravitationally lensed quasar Q2237+0305 to study low-ionization absorption systems and their differences in terms of projected velocity and column density across the lines of sight. We detect Ca II absorption from our Galaxy and a system of high-velocity clouds from the lensing galaxy (z = 0.039) with multiple Ca II components in all three sight lines. Unlike the situation in our Galaxy, there is no prominent Ca II absorption component (with an equivalent width exceeding 60-70 mA) close to the velocity centroid of the lensing galaxy Q2237+0305. Instead, Ca II components with total equivalent widths similar to those of Galactic intermediate- and high-velocity clouds are spread out over several hundred kilometers per second in projection along the sight lines at impact parameters of less than 1 kpc through the bulge of the galaxy. A Ca II absorbing thick disk as in our Galaxy does not seem to extend into the bulge region of the 2237+0305 galaxy, whereas high-velocity clouds seem to be a more universal feature. We have also studied three low-ionization Mg II-Fe II systems in detail. All three Mg II systems cover all three lines of sight, suggesting that the gaseous structures giving rise to Mg II complexes are larger than ~0.5 kpc. However, in most cases it is difficult to trace individual Mg II "cloudlets" over distances larger than 200-300 h pc, indicating that typical sizes of the Mg II cloudlets are smaller than the sizes inferred earlier for the individual clouds of high-ionization gas seen in C IV absorption. We tentatively interpret the absorption pattern of the strongest Mg II system in terms of an expanding bubble or galactic wind and show that the possible loci occupied by the model bubble in radius-velocity space overlap with the observed characteristics of Galactic supershells.

title: Glimpses of the Interstellar Medium at Redshift 3.5
abstract: We have obtained high resolution (FWHM = 4.4 km/s) Keck spectra of images A and C of the gravitationally lensed QSO Q1422+231. The images are separated by 1.3" on the sky. In an absorption system at z = 3.538 gas column density variations by an order of magnitude and velocity shear on the order of 10 km/s are observed in the low ionization (SiII, CII) lines. The transverse separation between the lines of sight in the absorbing cloud is estimated to be as small as 26 parsec, corresponding to an effective angular resolution of 4 milliarcseconds as seen from the Earth. In contrast, the high ionization (CIV) gas appears mostly featureless and thus must be considerably more extended. The abundances of the elements carbon, silicon and oxygen appear to be close to the solar values. The observation provides the first spatially and kinematically resolved probe of the interstellar medium at high redshift on scales small enough to be influenced by individual stars or star clusters. The mass associated with the low ionization "cloudlets" is likely to be less than about 3000 M_solar and possibly less than 1 M_solar. The velocity shear seen across the lines of sight is too large to be caused by galactic bulk motion, so the velocity field of the low ionization gas must be strongly influenced by small scale local gasdynamics. While it cannot presently be excluded that the disturbances of the gas are due to high velocity outflows from the background QSO, the observed velocity and density structure of the z=3.538 system is consistent with our line of sight running through an expanding shell of gas, possibly a supernova bubble or a stellar wind.

title: The metal line systems in hs1700+6416: evidence for inhomogeneities
abstract: We present a high S/N ratio optical spectrum of the bright quasar HS1700+6416. These data usefully complement the UV HST data from Vogel and Reimers (1995). We analyse the metal line systems using photo-ionization models allowing for inhomogeneities in the gas. The models are able to reproduce within a factor of two the large N(HeI)/N(HI) ratio together with the mean column densities of the heavy element species observed in the z=2 systems. The density contrast between low and high density regions is of the order of 30. Although the [O/C] abundance ratio seems slighly larger than solar, firm conclusion should await higher spectral resolution data. A break at the HeII ionization limit of a factor of ten is acceptable in the ionizing spectrum. Abundances are found to be about 0.08 solar. This together with other determinations from the literature indicates that there is evolution in the metal content of metal line systems with redshift: [Mg/H] is slighly below solar at z=0.7 and [C/H]=0.1-0.01 at z=2. We detect an associated CIV system at z=2.7126 in which there is some evidence for the presence of NeVIII, probably NeVI, NeVII, and possibly SiXII.

title: Small Scale Structure in the Universe and the Distribution of Baryons at High Redshift
abstract: We briefly discuss the relevance of Lyman alpha forest observations for measuring cosmological parameters, comparing the properties of high z QSO spectra with those of artifical spectra from hydrodynamic simulations, based on hierarchical cosmologies. In particular, we describe a measurement of the baryon content of the universe obtained by matching the average opacity of the Lyman alpha forest from simulations to the observed one from a new dataset observed with the Keck telescope. We then report on a search for possible small scale structure in the intergalactic medium which could be unresolved by current cosmological simulations. Observing column density gradients in the spectra of lensed QSOs we find the typical intergalactic gas cloud to be structureless down to at least the 4 % level, on scales of 0.1 kpc. Extending the study of lensed absorption to higher column densities we begin to sample the velocity field internal to high redshift galaxies. Remarkable differences in column density (of order 50 %) and projected velocity (tens of km/s) between lines of sight separated by only a few hundred parsecs are found, and we may be observing structure in the early interstellar medium.