Using the W as a standard candle to reach the top

Precision measurements of the top quark mass at hadron colliders have been notoriously difficult. Energy-Energy Correlators (EECs) provide clean access to angular correlations in the hadronic energy flux, but their application to the precision mass measurements is less direct since they measure a dimensionless angular scale. Inspired by the use of standard candles in cosmology, we will show that a single EEC-based observable can be constructed that reflects the characteristic angular scales of both the W boson and top quark masses. This gives direct access to the dimensionless quantity mt/mW, from which mt can be extracted in a well-defined short-distance scheme as a function of the well-known mW. We will demonstrate several remarkable properties of this observable as well as its statistical feasibility. This proposal provides a road map for a rich program for top mass determination at the LHC with record precision.