One Flow to Correct Them all: Improving Simulations in High-Energy Physics with a Single Normalising Flow and a Switch

Computing and Software for Big Science, vol. 8, pp. 15

Abstract

Simulated events are key ingredients in almost all high-energy physics analyses. However, imperfections in the simulation can lead to sizeable differences between the observed data and simulated events. The effects of such mismodelling on relevant observables must be corrected either effectively via scale factors, with weights or by modifying the distributions of the observables and their correlations. We introduce a correction method that transforms one multidimensional distribution (simulation) into another one (data) using a simple architecture based on a single normalising flow with a boolean condition. We demonstrate the effectiveness of the method on a physics-inspired toy dataset with non-trivial mismodelling of several observables and their correlations.

Authors 6

1. Caio Daumann corresponding Aachen III. Physikalisches Institut A

   RWTH Aachen University

   Affiliation as printed

   RWTH Aachen University, III. Physikalisches Institut A, Aachen, Germany

2. M. Donegà

   ETH Zurich

   Affiliation as printed

   ETH Zürich, Zürich, Switzerland

3. J. Erdmann Aachen III. Physikalisches Institut A

   RWTH Aachen University

   Affiliation as printed

   RWTH Aachen University, III. Physikalisches Institut A, Aachen, Germany

4. M. Galli

   ETH Zurich

   Affiliation as printed

   ETH Zürich, Zürich, Switzerland

5. Jan Lukas Späh Aachen III. Physikalisches Institut A

   RWTH Aachen University

   Affiliation as printed

   RWTH Aachen University, III. Physikalisches Institut A, Aachen, Germany

6. D. Valsecchi

   ETH Zurich

   Affiliation as printed

   ETH Zürich, Zürich, Switzerland