Observation of the associated production of a single top quark - and a W boson in pp collisions at root s=8 TeV

Abstract

The first observation of the associated production of a single top quark and a W boson is presented. The analysis is based on a data set corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 12.2 fb(-1) of proton-proton collisions at root s = 8 TeV recorded by the CMS experiment at the LHC. Events with two leptons and a jet originating from a b quark are selected. A multivariate analysis based on kinematic and topological properties is used to separate the signal from the dominant (tt) over bar background. An excess consistent with the signal hypothesis is observed, with a significance which corresponds to 6.1 standard deviations above a background-only hypothesis. The measured production cross section is 23.4 +/- 5.4 pb, in agreement with the standard model prediction.