By using the ATLAS detector, observations have been made of a centrality-dependent dijet asymmetry in the collisions of lead ions at the Large Hadron Collider. In a sample of lead-lead events with a per-nucleon center of mass energy of 2.76 TeV, selected with a minimum bias trigger, jets are reconstructed in fine-grained, longitudinally segmented electromagnetic and hadronic calorimeters. The transverse energies of dijets in opposite hemispheres are observed to become systematically more unbalanced with increasing event centrality leading to a large number of events which contain highly asymmetric dijets. This is the first observation of an enhancement of events with such large dijet asymmetries, not observed in proton-proton collisions, which may point to an interpretation in terms of strong jet energy loss in a hot, dense medium.

Studies of the spin and parity quantum numbers of the Higgs boson are presented, based on proton–proton collision data collected by the ATLAS experiment at the LHC. The Standard Model spin–parity JP=0+JP=0+ hypothesis is compared with alternative hypotheses using the Higgs boson decays H→γγH→γγ, H→ZZ⁎→4ℓH→ZZ⁎→4ℓ and H→WW⁎→ℓνℓνH→WW⁎→ℓνℓν, as well as the combination of these channels. The analysed dataset corresponds to an integrated luminosity of 20.7 fb−1 collected at a centre-of-mass energy of √s=8TeV. For the H→ZZ⁎→4ℓH→ZZ⁎→4ℓ decay mode the dataset corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 4.6 fb−1 collected at √s=7TeV is included. The data are compatible with the Standard Model JP=0+JP=0+ quantum numbers for the Higgs boson, whereas all alternative hypotheses studied in this Letter, namely some specific JP=0−,1+,1−,2+JP=0−,1+,1−,2+ models, are excluded at confidence levels above 97.8%. This exclusion holds independently of the assumptions on the coupling strengths to the Standard Model particles and in the case of the JP=2+JP=2+ model, of the relative fractions of gluon-fusion and quark–antiquark production of the spin-2 particle. The data thus provide evidence for the spin-0 nature of the Higgs boson, with positive parity being strongly preferre

A measurement of the production processes of the recently discovered Higgs boson is performed in the two-photon final state using 4.5 fb −1 of proton-proton collisions data at ffiffi ffi s p ¼ 7 TeV and 20.3 fb −1 at ffiffi ffi s p ¼ 8 TeV collected by the ATLAS detector at the Large Hadron Collider. The number of observed Higgs boson decays to diphotons divided by the corresponding Standard Model prediction, called the signal strength, is found to be μ ¼ 1.17 AE 0.27 at the value of the Higgs boson mass measured by ATLAS, m H ¼ 125.4 GeV. The analysis is optimized to measure the signal strengths for individual Higgs boson production processes at this value of m H . They are found to be μ ggF ¼ 1.32 AE 0.38, μ VBF ¼ 0.8 AE 0.7, μ WH ¼ 1.0 AE 1.6, μ ZH ¼ 0.1 þ3.7 −0.1 , and μ ttH ¼ 1.6 þ2.7 −1.8 , for Higgs boson production through gluon fusion, vector-boson fusion, and in association with a W or Z boson or a top-quark pair, respectively. Compared with the previously published ATLAS analysis, the results reported here also benefit from a new energy calibration procedure for photons and the subsequent reduction of the systematic uncertainty on the diphoton mass resolution. No significant deviations from the predictions of the Standard Model are found.

The χ(b)(nP) quarkonium states are produced in proton-proton collisions at the Large Hadron Collider at sqrt[s] = 7  TeV and recorded by the ATLAS detector. Using a data sample corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 4.4  fb(-1), these states are reconstructed through their radiative decays to Υ(1S,2S) with Υ → μ+ μ-. In addition to the mass peaks corresponding to the decay modes χ(b)(1P,2P) → Υ(1S)γ, a new structure centered at a mass of 10.530 ± 0.005(stat) ± 0.009(syst)  GeV is also observed, in both the Υ(1S)γ and Υ(2S)γ decay modes. This structure is interpreted as the χ(b)(3P) system.

A search for scalar particles decaying via narrow resonances into two photons in the mass range 65-600 GeV is performed using 20.3  fb(-1) of √s 8 TeV pp collision data collected with the ATLAS detector at the Large Hadron Collider. The recently discovered Higgs boson is treated as a background. No significant evidence for an additional signal is observed. The results are presented as limits at the 95% confidence level on the production cross section of a scalar boson times branching ratio into two photons, in a fiducial volume where the reconstruction efficiency is approximately independent of the event topology. The upper limits set extend over a considerably wider mass range than previous searches.