The impact of the LHC Z-boson transverse momentum data on PDF determinations

The LHC has recently released precise measurements of the transverse momentum distribution of the Z-boson that provide a unique constraint on the structure of the proton. Theoretical developments now allow the prediction of these observables through next-to-next-to-leading order (NNLO) in perturbative QCD. In this work we study the impact of incorporating these latest advances into a determination of parton distribution functions (PDFs) through NNLO including the recent ATLAS and CMS 7TeV and 8TeV p(T)(Z) data. We investigate the consistency of these measurements in a global fit to the available data and quantify the impact of including the p(T)(Z) distributions on the PDFs. The inclusion of these new data sets significantly reduces the uncertainties on select parton distributions and the corresponding parton-parton luminosities. In particular, we find that the p(T)(Z) data ultimately leads to a reduction of the PDF uncertainty on the gluon-fusion and vector-boson fusion Higgs production cross sections by about 30%, while keeping the central values nearly unchanged.