Constraints on Models of the Higgs Boson with Exotic Spin and Parity using Decays to Bottom-Antibottom Quarks in the Full CDF Data Set

Abstract

A search for particles with the same mass and couplings as those of the standard model Higgs boson but different spin and parity quantum numbers is presented. We test two specific alternative Higgs boson hypotheses: a pseudoscalar Higgs boson with spin-parity JP=0- and a gravitonlike Higgs boson with JP=2+, assuming for both a mass of 125 GeV/c2. We search for these exotic states produced in association with a vector boson and decaying into a bottom-antibottom quark pair. The vector boson is reconstructed through its decay into an electron or muon pair, or an electron or muon and a neutrino, or it is inferred from an imbalance in total transverse momentum. We use expected kinematic differences between events containing exotic Higgs bosons and those containing standard model Higgs bosons. The data were collected by the CDF experiment at the Tevatron proton-antiproton collider, operating at a center-of-mass energy of vs=1.96 TeV, and correspond to an integrated luminosity of 9.45 fb-1. We exclude deviations from the predictions of the standard model with a Higgs boson of mass 125 GeV/c2 at the level of 5 standard deviations, assuming signal strengths for exotic boson production equal to the prediction for the standard model Higgs boson, and set upper limits of approximately 30% relative to the standard model rate on the possible rate of production of each exotic state.