Associated Production of W/Z Gauge Bosons and Jets in Hadronic Collisions

Most new particles predicted by theories beyond the Standard Model of particle physics decay to jets and electroweak gauge bosons, W and Z. The search and study of these particles therefore require a solid understanding of the associated production of W/Z and jets. This review provides an introduction to the theoretical and experimental aspects of these processes in the context of the Standard Model. First, we introduce the challenges presented by the calculation of the production properties of W/Z plus jets in hadronic collisions and review the tools developed to quantitatively characterize such final states. Then, we summarize the current experimental results at the Tevatron and LHC colliders and discuss the comparison between the available data and the theoretical predictions.