====================================== Type A ====================================== General remarks: In the text, there are several words with multiple components. It would be really nice to always connect them as such. E.g. “background-only hypothesis” is written like that and can be understood easily. “Data taking conditions” like this is ambiguous. Furthermore, a lot of sentences and paragraphs start with “the”. For some variety it would be nicer to – at least sometimes – change that. E.g. in line 145, the two parts of the sentence could easily be exchanged (starting with “to construct...”). Even changing it to “this” from time to time would vary the phrasing slightly. Finally, whenever ranges of percentages are given, they look very dense. Inserting a half space between the dash and the number would ease that up (e.g. lines 214, 223, 237). Line 22: analysis strategy lead[s] to Line 34: “MC simulated events”: Is that how you say it? Lines 35/36: Two sets of MC samples [are used] (instead of end of sentence) Line 44: Simulation[s] Line 78: the above [described/mentioned] jet finding algorithm Lines 114/115: Start final sentence of paragraph with “Thus” (currently, it is kind of disconnected from the aforementioned achievements of the BDT) Line 144: remaining jet with highest pt (not event with highest pt, or I completely misunderstood the sentence) Line 207: … b tagging, trigger, […] lepton identification efficiencies … Line 237: … result in […] uncertainties of … Line 266: drop “:” before equation, no reason to interrupt sentence Figure 1: don’t double “signal regions”: either “in each of the signal regions, SR-2/3j-1b …” or “BDT distributions for events in SR-2/3j-1b …” Figure A.1: In right pane: small p for pT. Also don’t double “in SR-2/3j-1b events”. Could be avoided by e.g. “… recoiling jet (middle) as well as the pT of the Z boson … values in excess of 0.5.” ====================================== Type B ====================================== Abstract: tZq is only described as tZ (first line: “top quark in association with a Z boson”) → add “and an additional parton”. “Multiple jets” is quite vague. Actually used lower threshold would be nice (e.g. “and at least two jets”). “In agreement with the standard model expectation”: What is the expectation from SM? Line 5: again tZq: It does not really become clear, why the parton is needed. To obtain a cleaner sample? And can it also be a gluon or only a quark (since denoted as tZq)? Line 26: It should become clear that the strength of the magnetic field is reached almost everywhere inside of the solenoid, e.g. “providing an almost homogeneous magnetic field of 3.8 T.” Line 51: “distributions are corrected” – how? Line 66: Where does the forward jet come from? The additional parton? Line 68: Only requirements for 2017 listed. Have they been the same in 2016? Line 77: Why is a sum over pt squared used? Line 106: cross-check: Is one of these performing better than the other (BDT/neural network)? If so, by how much? Or is there any reason to use the BDT for the analysis and the neural network as a check and not vice versa? Line 158: event categories = signal regions? If so, rephrase to “background contributions to the three SRs …” Line 161: predicted directly from data – how? Which events are used to do that? Line 174: “not contrained” – why? Too insignificant? Not present in data? Not enough data? Or can’t they just not be constrained for some other reason? Line 181: Internal and external conversions – what are they? Line 199: What does it mean “the probability is applied to data”. As an event weight? Lines 223/228: What do these bins refer to? Lines 267/278: As in abstract: What is the SM expectation? Line 274: Also as in abstract: tZq should not only be described as tZ Figure 1: From what can the BDT distributions be expected? Training? MC? How can the signal be seen? Not a single point is outside of the uncertainties.