Measurement of the top quark polarization and $\mathrm{t\bar{t}}$ spin correlations using dilepton final states in proton-proton collisions at $\sqrt{s} =$ 13 TeV

Understand

Measurements of the top quark polarization and top quark pair ($\mathrm{t\bar{t}}$) spin correlations are presented using events containing two oppositely charged leptons (e$^+$e$^-$, e$^\pm\mu^\mp$, or $\mu^+\mu^-$) produced in proton-proton collisions at a center-of-mass energy of 13 TeV.

• The data were recorded by the CMS experiment at the LHC in 2016 and correspond to an integrated luminosity of 35.9 fb$^{-1}$.
• A set of parton-level normalized differential cross sections, sensitive to each of the independent coefficients of the spin-dependent parts of the $\mathrm{t\bar{t}}$ production density matrix, is measured for the first time at 13 TeV.
• The measured distributions and extracted coefficients are compared with standard model predictions from simulations at next-to-leading-order (NLO) accuracy in quantum chromodynamics (QCD), and from NLO QCD calculations including electroweak corrections.