A novel technique for studying the Z boson transverse momentum distribution at hadron colliders

We present a novel method for studying the shape of the Z boson transverse momentum distribution, QT, at hadron colliders in p over(p, -) / pp → Z / γ* → l+ l-. The QT is decomposed into two orthogonal components; one transverse and the other parallel to the di-lepton thrust axis. We show that the transverse component is almost insensitive to the momentum resolution of the individual leptons and is thus more precisely determined on an event-by-event basis than the QT. Furthermore, we demonstrate that a measurement of the distribution of this transverse component is substantially less sensitive to the dominant experimental systematics (resolution unfolding and QT dependence of event selection efficiencies) reported in the previous measurements of the QT distribution. © 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.