Measurements of inclusive W+jets production rates as a function of jet transverse momentum in pp¯ collisions at s=1.96 TeV

This Letter describes measurements of inclusive W(→eν)+n jet cross sections (n=1-4), presented as total inclusive cross sections and differentially in the nth jet transverse momentum. The measurements are made using data corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 4.2 fb−1 collected by the D0 detector at the Fermilab Tevatron Collider, and achieve considerably smaller uncertainties on W+jets production cross sections than previous measurements. The measurements are compared to next-to-leading order perturbative QCD (pQCD) calculations in the n=1-3 jet multiplicity bins and to leading order pQCD calculations in the 4-jet bin. The measurements are generally in agreement with pQCD calculations, although certain regions of phase space are identified where these predictions could better match the data.