The production of the $W$ and $Z$ bosons in single diffractive processes at the LHC is investigated taking into account the ATLAS, CMS and LHCb acceptances and considering different assumptions for the flavor content of the Pomeron. The total cross sections and pseudorapidity distributions are estimated for $pp$ collisions at $\sqrt{s}=13\mathrm{TeV}$. Our results indicate that a future experimental analysis of the ratio between the $W$ and $Z$ cross sections can be used to probe the flavor content of the Pomeron.

• Received 24 January 2019

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevD.99.034017

Published by the American Physical Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article’s title, journal citation, and DOI. Funded by SCOAP³.

Published by the American Physical Society