Abstract: A measurement of the cross section of top quark pair production in proton-proton collisions recorded with the ATLAS detector at the Large Hadron Collider at a centre-of-mass energy of 7 TeV is reported. The data sample used corresponds to an integrated luminosity of 2.05 fb(-1). Events with an isolated electron or muon and a tau lePton decaying hadronically are used. In addition, a large missing transverse momentum and two or more energetic jets are required. At least one of the jets must be identified as originating from a b quark. The measured cross section, sigma(t (t) over bar) = 186 +/- 13 (stat.) +/- 20 (syst.) +/- 7 (lumi.) pb, is in good agreement with the Standard Model prediction.

Abstract: The production of events with multiple high transverse momentum particles including charged leptons and jets is measured, using 1.04 fb(-1) of proton-proton collision data recorded by the ATLAS detector during the first half of 2011 at root s = 7 TeV. No excess beyond Standard Model expectations is observed, and upper limits on the fiducial cross sections for non-Standard Model production of these final states are set. Using models for string ball and black hole production and decay, exclusion contours are determined as a function of mass threshold and the fundamental gravity scale. (C) 2012 CERN. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Abstract: In models of anomaly-mediated supersymmetry breaking (AMSB), the lightest chargino is predicted to have a lifetime long enough to be detected in collider experiments. This letter explores AMSB scenarios in pp collisions at root s = 7 TeV by attempting to identify decaying charginos which result in tracks that appear to have few associated hits in the outer region of the tracking system. The search was based on data corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 1.02 fb(-1) collected with the ATLAS detector in 2011. The p(T) spectrum of candidate tracks is found to be consistent with the expectation from Standard Model background processes and constraints on the lifetime and the production cross section were obtained. In the minimal AMSB framework with m(3/2) < 32 TeV, m(0) < 1.5 TeV, tan beta = 5 and μ> 0, a chargino having mass below 92 GeV and a lifetime between 0.5 ns and 2 ns is excluded at 95 % confidence level.

Abstract: A combined search for the Standard Model Higgs boson with the ATLAS experiment at the LHC using datasets corresponding to integrated luminosities from 1.04 fb(-1) to 4.9 fb(-1) of pp collisions collected at root s = 7 TeV is presented. The Higgs boson mass ranges 112.9-115.5 GeV, 131-238 GeV and 251-466 GeV are excluded at the 95% confidence level (CL), while the range 124-519 GeV is expected to be excluded in the absence of a signal. An excess of events is observed around m(H) similar to 126 GeV with a local significance of 3.5 standard deviations (sigma). The local significances of H -> gamma, H -> ZZ(()*()) -> l(+)l(-)l'(+)l'(-) and H -> WW(*()) l(+)nu l'(-)(nu) over bar, the three most sensitive channels in this mass range, are 2.8 sigma, 2.1 sigma and 1.4 sigma. respectively. The global probability for the background to produce such a fluctuation anywhere in the explored Higgs boson mass range 110-600 GeV is estimated to be similar to 1.4% or, equivalently, 2.2 sigma.

Abstract: Pseudorapidity gap distributions in proton-proton collisions at root s = 7 TeV are studied using a minimum bias data sample with an integrated luminosity of 7.1 μb(-1). Cross sections are measured differentially in terms of Delta eta(F), the larger of the pseudorapidity regions extending to the limits of the ATLAS sensitivity, at eta = +/- 4.9, in which no final state particles are produced above a transverse momentum threshold p(T)(cut). The measurements span the region 0 < Delta eta(F) < 8 for 200 MeV < p(T)(cut) < 800 MeV. At small Delta eta(F), the data test the reliability of hadronisation models in describing rapidity and transverse momentum fluctuations in final state particle production. The measurements at larger gap sizes are dominated by contributions from the single diffractive dissociation process (pp -> Xp), enhanced by double dissociation (pp -> XY) where the invariant mass of the lighter of the two dissociation systems satisfies M-Y less than or similar to 7 GeV. The resulting cross section is ds sigma/d Delta eta(F) approximate to 1 mb for Delta eta(F) greater than or similar to 3. The large rapidity gap data are used to constrain the value of the Pomeron intercept appropriate to triple Regge models of soft diffraction. The cross section integrated over all gap sizes is compared with other LHC inelastic cross section measurements.