The first complete calculation of the next-to-leading-order electroweak corrections to four-lepton production at the LHC is presented, where all off-shell effects of intermediate Z bosons and photons are taken into account. Focusing on the mixed final state μ+μ−e+e−, we study differential cross sections that are particularly interesting for Higgs-boson analyses. The electroweak corrections are divided into photonic and purely weak corrections. The former exhibit patterns familiar from similar W/Z-boson production processes with very large radiative tails near resonances and kinematical shoulders. The weak corrections are of the generic size of 5% and show interesting variations, in particular a sign change between the regions of resonant Z-pair production and the Higgs signal.
@article{arxiv.1601.07787,
title = {Electroweak corrections to $pp \to \mu^+\mu^-e^+e^- + X$ at the LHC -- a Higgs background study},
author = {B. Biedermann and A. Denner and S. Dittmaier and L. Hofer and B. Jäger},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1601.07787},
year = {2016}
}