This Letter describes the current most precise measurement of the $W$ boson pair production cross section and most sensitive test of anomalous $WW\gamma$ and $WWZ$ couplings in $p\overline{p}$ collisions at a center-of-mass energy of 1.96 TeV. The $WW$ candidates are reconstructed from decays containing two charged leptons and two neutrinos. Using data collected by the CDF II detector from $3.6{\mathrm{fb}}^{-1}$ of integrated luminosity, a total of 654 candidate events are observed with an expected background of $320\pm 47$ events. The measured cross section is $\sigma (p\overline{p}\to W^{+}{W}^{-}+X)=12.1\pm 0.9(\mathrm{stat}{)}_{-1.4}^{+1.6}(\mathrm{syst})\mathrm{pb}$, which is in good agreement with the standard model prediction. The same data sample is used to place constraints on anomalous $WW\gamma$ and $WWZ$ couplings.

• Received 22 December 2009
• Corrected 23 June 2010

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.104.201801