Search for the standard model Higgs boson in associated $WH$ production in $9.7\ \text{fb}^{ -1}$ of $p\bar p$ collisions with the D0 detector

Abstract

We present a search for the standard model Higgs boson in final states with a charged lepton (electron or muon), missing transverse energy, and two or three jets, at least one of which is identified as a b-quark jet. The search is primarily sensitive to WH→ℓνbb¯ production and uses data corresponding to 9.7 fb−1 of integrated luminosity collected with the D0 detector at the Fermilab Tevatron pp¯ Collider at s=1.96 TeV. We observe agreement between the data and the expected background. For a Higgs boson mass of 125 GeV, we set a 95% C.L. upper limit on the production of a standard model Higgs boson of 5.2×σSM, where σSM is the standard model Higgs boson production cross section, while the expected limit is 4.7×σSM.