On the Statistical Interpretation of Discoveries in LHC Data

[2605.24441] On the Statistical Interpretation of Discoveries in LHC Data Skip to main content Search Submit Donate Log in Physics > Data Analysis, Statistics and Probability arXiv:2605.24441 (physics) [Submitted on 23 May 2026 ( v1 ), last revised 26 Aug 2026 (this version, v2)] Title: On the Statistical Interpretation of Discoveries in LHC Data Authors: S. V. Chekanov , E. J. Weik View PDF HTML (experimental) Abstract: We examine discovery criteria at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) within a model-independent framework, with particular emphasis on the statistical signatures of new physics. This study is motivated by the recent shift from model-specific searches based on a small number of distributions to broad, model-agnostic strategies, which offer substantially greater sensitivity to unexpected phenomena. We revisit the well-known criterion of a local statistical significance of $5\,\sigma$ for the observation of new phenomena in invariant-mass distributions and discuss how this threshold should be modified to account for look-elsewhere effects arising not only from multiple bins within a given distribution, but also from the simultaneous consideration of multiple distributions. We present a simple but statistically conservative relation between local and global significances in the presence of multiple invariant-mass distributions at the LHC, which can serve as a useful first approximation for planning future measurements. Comments: 9 pages, 2 figures Subjects: Data Analysis, Statistics and Probability (physics.data-an) ; High Energy Physics - Experiment (hep-ex); High Energy Physics - Phenomenology (hep-ph) Report number: HEP-ANL-203752 Cite as: arXiv:2605.24441 [physics.data-an] (or arXiv:2605.24441v2 [physics.data-an] for this version) https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2605.24441 Focus to learn more arXiv-issued DOI via DataCite Journal reference: J. Phys. G: Nucl. Part. Phys. 53 (2026), 085003 Related DOI : https://doi.org/10.1088/1361-6471/ae996d Focus to learn more DOI(s) linking to related resources Submission history From: Sergei Chekanov V. [ view email ] [v1] Sat, 23 May 2026 07:22:25 UTC (53 KB) [v2] Wed, 26 Aug 2026 19:13:11 UTC (54 KB) Full-text links: Access Paper: View PDF HTML (experimental) TeX Source view license Current browse context: physics.data-an < prev | next > new | recent | 2026-05 Change to browse by: hep-ex hep-ph physics References & Citations INSPIRE HEP SciX Google Scholar Semantic Scholar export BibTeX citation Bookmark Bibliographic Tools Bibliographic and Citation Tools Bibliographic Explorer Toggle Bibliographic Explorer ( What is the Explorer? ) Connected Papers Toggle Connected Papers ( What is Connected Papers? ) Litmaps Toggle Litmaps ( What is Litmaps? ) scite.ai Toggle scite Smart Citations ( What are Smart Citations? ) Code, Data, Media Code, Data and Media Associated with this Article alphaXiv Toggle alphaXiv ( What is alphaXiv? ) Links to Code Toggle CatalyzeX Code Finder for Papers ( What is CatalyzeX? ) DagsHub Toggle DagsHub ( What is DagsHub? ) GotitPub Toggle Gotit.pub ( What is GotitPub? ) Huggingface Toggle Hugging Face ( What is Huggingface? ) ScienceCast Toggle ScienceCast ( What is ScienceCast? ) Demos Demos Replicate Toggle Replicate ( What is Replicate? ) Spaces Toggle Hugging Face Spaces ( What is Spaces? ) Spaces Toggle TXYZ.AI ( What is TXYZ.AI? ) Related Papers Recommenders and Search Tools Link to Influence Flower Influence Flower ( What are Influence Flowers? ) Core recommender toggle CORE Recommender ( What is CORE? ) Author Venue Institution Topic About arXivLabs arXivLabs: experimental projects with community collaborators arXivLabs is a framework that allows collaborators to develop and share new arXiv features directly on our website. Both individuals and organizations that work with arXivLabs have embraced and accepted our values of openness, community, excellence, and user data privacy. arXiv is committed to these values and only works with partners that adhere to them. Have an idea for a project that will add value for arXiv's community? Learn more about arXivLabs . Which authors of this paper are endorsers? | Disable MathJax ( What is MathJax? ) We gratefully acknowledge support from our major funders , member institutions , and all contributors. About · Help · Contact · Subscribe · Copyright · Privacy · Accessibility · Operational Status (opens in new tab)

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