Measurement of the t(t)over-bar production cross section in p(p)over-bar collisions at √s=1.96 TeV using events with large missing transverse energy and jets

In this paper we report a measurement of the t (t) over bar production cross section in p (p) over bar collisions at root s = 1.96 TeV using data corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 2.2 fb(-1) collected with the CDF II detector at the Tevatron accelerator. We select events with significant missing transverse energy and high jet multiplicity. This measurement vetoes the presence of explicitly identified electrons and muons, thus enhancing the tau contribution of t (t) over bar decays. Signal events are discriminated from the background using a neural network, and heavy flavor jets are identified by a secondary-vertex tagging algorithm. We measure a t (t) over bar production cross section of 7.99 +/- 0.55(stat) +/- 0.76(syst) +/- 0.46(lumi) pb, assuming a top mass m(top) = 172.5 GeV/c(2), in agreement with previous measurements and standard model predictions.