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Abstract

The detection of production of a pair of Higgs bosons before the end of
LHC operation would be a clear evidence of New Physics (NP). As searches
for non-resonant production of Higgs pairs are being designed it is of
particular importance to be able to conveniently present current
experimental results in terms of limits in the most 'model-independent'
fashion possible. To this end, in this article we provide an analytic
parametrization of the differential Higgs-pair production at the LHC in
the effective field theory (EFT) extension of the SM. It results from a
fit to the theory prediction for the gg -> hh cross section at the 13
TeV LHC. Subsequently the resulting formula is used for a reweighing
technique that allows to recast exclusion bounds from ATLAS and CMS hh
-> gamma gamma bb<mml:mo stretchy="true"><overbar></mml:mover> searches
to any point of the considered EFT parameter space. We demonstrate with
a fast simulation of the LHC detectors that with this approach it is
possible to cover the continuous EFT parameter space, taking correctly
into account the efficiencies of signal selections, without the
necessity of rerunning a large number of full detector simulations.
Finally, the resulting exclusion bounds are confronted with several
explicit models, such as setups with additional scalars, including 2HDM,
vector-like fermions, and minimal composite Higgs models, which are
mapped to the EFT.