Study of W boson polarisations and Triple Gauge boson Couplings in the reaction e+e- -> W+W- at LEP 2

Understand

A determination of the single W Spin Density Matrix (SDM) elements in the reaction e+e- -> W+W- -> l nu q qbar (l=e/mu) is reported at centre-of-mass energies between 189 and 209 GeV.

• The data sample used corresponds to an integrated luminosity of 520 pb^{-1} taken by DELPHI between 1998 and 2000.
• The single W SDM elements, rho_{tau tau'}^{W+-} (tau,tau' = +/-1 or 0), are determined as a function of the W- production angle with respect to the e- beam direction and are obtained from measurements of the W decay products by the application of suitable projection operators, Lambda_{tau tau'}, which assume the V-A coupling of the W boson to fermions.
• The measured SDM elements are used to obtain the fraction of longitudinally polarised Ws, with the result: sigma_L/sigma_tot = 24.9 +/- 4.5(stat) +/- 2.2(syst) % at a mean energy of 198 GeV.