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Neutrinos are the second most ubiquitous Standard Model particles in the universe. On the other hand, they are also the ones least likely to interact. Connecting these two points suggests that when a neutrino is detected, it can divulge unique pieces of information...
A search is performed for electroweak production of a vector-like top quark partner T of charge 2/3 in association with a top or bottom quark, using proton-proton collision data at $\sqrt{s} =$ 13 TeV collected by the CMS experiment at the LHC in 2016. The data sample corresponds to an integrated luminosity of 35.9 fb$^{-1}$. The search targets T quarks over a wide range of masses and fractional widths, decaying to a top quark and either a Higgs boson or a Z boson in fully hadronic final states. The search is performed using two experimentally distinct signatures that depend on whether or not each quark from the decays of the top quark, Higgs boson, or Z boson produces an individual resolved jet. Jet substructure, b tagging, and kinematic variables are used to identify the top quark and boson jets, and also to suppress the standard model backgrounds. The data are found to be consistent with the expected backgrounds. Upper limits at 95% confidence level are set on the cross sections for T quark-mediated production of tHQq, tZQq, and their sum, where Q is the associated top or bottom heavy quark and q is another associated quark. The limits are given for each search signature for various T quark widths up to 30% of the T quark mass, and are between 2 pb and 20 fb for T quark masses in the range 0.6-2.6 TeV. These results are significantly more sensitive than prior searches for electroweak single production of T$\to$tH and represent the first constraints on T$\to$tZ using hadronic decays of the Z boson with this production mode.
Evidence for Higgs boson decay to a pair of muons is presented. This result combines searches in four exclusive categories targeting the production of the Higgs boson via gluon fusion, via vector boson fusion, in association with a vector boson, and in association with a top quark-antiquark pair. The analysis is performed using proton-proton collision data at $ \sqrt{s} $ = 13 TeV, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 137 fb$^{−1}$, recorded by the CMS experiment at the CERN LHC. An excess of events over the back- ground expectation is observed in data with a significance of 3.0 standard deviations, where the expectation for the standard model (SM) Higgs boson with mass of 125.38 GeV is 2.5. The combination of this result with that from data recorded at $ \sqrt{s} $ = 7 and 8 TeV, corresponding to integrated luminosities of 5.1 and 19.7 fb$^{−1}$, respectively, increases both the expected and observed significances by 1%. The measured signal strength, relative to the SM prediction, is $ {1.19}_{-0.39}^{+0.40}{\left(\mathrm{stat}\right)}_{-0.14}^{+0.15}\left(\mathrm{syst}\right) $. This result constitutes the first evidence for the decay of the Higgs boson to second generation fermions and is the most precise measurement of the Higgs boson coupling to muons reported to date.[graphic not available: see fulltext]
A new measurement of the muon anomalous magnetic moment has been recently reported by the Fermilab Muon g-2 collaboration and shows a 4.2σ departure from the most precise and reliable calculation of this quantity in the Standard Model. Assuming that this discrepancy is due to new physics, we consider its relation with other potential anomalies, especially in the muon sector, as well as clues from the early universe. Here, we comment on new physics solutions discussed extensively in the literature in the past decades, to finally concentrate on a simple supersymmetric model that also provides a dark matter explanation. We show results for an interesting region of supersymmetric parameter space that can be probed at the high luminosity LHC and future colliders, while leading to values of (g μ – 2) consistent with the Fermilab and Brookhaven (g μ – 2) measurements. Such a parameter region can simultaneously realize a Bino-like dark matter candidate compatible with direct detection constraints for small to moderate values of the Higgsino mass parameter |μ|.
Decays of Higgs boson-like particles into multileptons is a well-motivated process for investigating physics beyond the Standard Model (SM). A unique feature of this final state is the precision with which the SM is known. As a result, simulations are used directly to estimate the background. Current searches consider specific models and typically focus on those with a single free parameter to simplify the analysis and interpretation. In this paper, we explore recent proposals for signal model agnostic searches using machine learning in the multilepton final state. These tools can be used to simultaneously search for many models, some of which have no dedicated search at the Large Hadron Collider. We find that the machine learning methods offer broad coverage across parameter space beyond where current searches are sensitive, with a necessary loss of performance compared to dedicated searches by only about one order of magnitude.
Differential cross-sections are measured for the production of four charged leptons in association with two jets. These measurements are sensitive to final states in which the jets are produced via the strong interaction as well as to the purely-electroweak vector boson scattering process. The analysis is performed using proton-proton collision data collected by ATLAS at $\sqrt{s}$ = 13 TeV and with an integrated luminosity of 140 fb –1 . The data are corrected for the effects of detector inefficiency and resolution and are compared to state-of-the-art Monte Carlo event generator predictions. The differential cross-sections are used to search for anomalous weak-boson self-interactions that are induced by dimension-six and dimension-eight operators in Standard Model effective field theory.
Future muon colliders with center-of-mass energy of $\mathcal{O}$ (1 – 10) TeV can provide a clean high-energy environment with advantages in searches for TeV-scale axion-like particles (ALPs), pseudo-Nambu-Goldstone bosons associated with spontaneously broken global symmetries, which are widely predicted in physics beyond the Standard Model (SM). We exploit ALP couplings to SM fermions, and guided by unitarity constraints, build a search strategy focusing on the ALP decay to top quark pairs at muon colliders. It is found that a large parameter space of TeV-scale ALPs with TeV-scale decay constants can be probed by utilizing the ALP-top quark coupling.
It has been known for some time that asymptotic parity invariance of weak interactions can provide a solution to the strong CP problem without the need for the axion. Left-right symmetric theories which employ a minimal Higgs sector consisting of a left-handed and a right-handed doublet is an example of such a theory wherein all fermion masses arise through a generalized seesaw mechanism. In this paper we present a way to understand the origin of matter-antimatter asymmetry as well as the dark matter content of the universe in these theories using the Affleck-Dine (AD) leptogenesis mechanism and inflaton decay, respectively. Three gauge singlet fermions are needed for this purpose, two of which help to implement the Dirac seesaw for neutrino masses while the third one becomes the non-thermal dark matter candidate. A soft lepton number breaking term involving the AD scalar field is used to generate lepton asymmetry which suffers no wash-out effects and maintains the Dirac nature of neutrinos. This framework thus provides a unified description of many of the unresolved puzzles of the standard model that require new physics.
Abstract We study the prospects for probing the Nnaturalness solution to the electroweak hierarchy problem with future gravitational wave observatories. Nnaturalness, in its simplest incarnation, predictsNcopies of the Standard Model with varying Higgs mass parameters. We show that in certain parameter regions the scalar reheaton transfers a substantial energy density to the sector with the smallest positive Higgs squared mass while remaining consistent with bounds on additional effective relativistic species. In this sector, all six quarks are much lighter than the corresponding QCD confinement scale, allowing for the possibility of a first-order chiral symmetry-breaking phase transition and an associated stochastic gravitational wave signal. We consider several scenarios characterizing the strongly-coupled phase transition dynamics and estimate the gravitational wave spectrum for each. Pulsar timing arrays (SKA), spaced-based interferometers (BBO, Ultimate-DECIGO,μAres, asteroid ranging), and astrometric measurements (THEIA) all have the potential to explore new regions of Nnaturalness parameter space, complementing probes from next generation cosmic microwave background radiation experiments.
Orbits of celestial objects, especially the geocentric and heliocentric ones, have been well explored to constrain new long-range forces beyond the Standard Model (SM), often referred to as fifth forces. In this paper, for the first time, we apply the motion of a spacecraft around Jupiter to probe fifth forces that don’t violate the equivalence principle. The spacecraft is the Juno orbiter, and ten of its early orbits already allow a precise determination of the Jovian gravitational field. We use the shift in the precession angle as a proxy to test non-gravitational interactions between Juno and Jupiter. Requiring that the contribution from the fifth force does not exceed the uncertainty of the precession shift inferred from data, we find that a new parameter space with the mass of the fifth-force mediator around 10 −14 eV is excluded at 95% C.L.
The first measurement of the inclusive and normalised differential cross sections of single top quark production in association with a W boson in proton-proton collisions at a centre-of-mass energy of 13.6 TeV is presented. The data were recorded with the CMS detector at the LHC in 2022, and correspond to an integrated luminosity of 34.7 fb −1 . The analysed events contain one muon and one electron in the final state. For the inclusive measurement, multivariate discriminants exploiting the kinematic properties of the events are used to separate the signal from the dominant top quark-antiquark production background. A cross section of $82.3\pm 2.1{\left(\textrm{stat}\right)}_{-9.7}^{+9.9}\left(\textrm{syst}\right)\pm 3.3\left(\textrm{lumi}\right)$ pb is obtained, consistent with the predictions of the standard model. A fiducial region is defined according to the detector acceptance to perform the differential measurements. The resulting differential distributions are unfolded to particle level and show good agreement with the predictions at next-to-leading order in perturbative quantum chromodynamics.
We investigate the phenomenology of a dark QCD sector interacting with the Standard Model (SM) via the electroweak (EW) portals. The portal interactions allow SM bosons, such as Z and h, or additional bosons that mix with them, to decay into dark quarks, producing dark showers. The light dark mesons are expected to be long-lived particles (LLPs), as their decays back to the SM states through the EW-portal interactions typically have macroscopic decay lengths. We focus on dark shower events initiated by various bosons at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). The most prominent signal is the displaced decay of GeV-scale dark pions as LLPs. Current limits on dark shower signals at LHC detectors are recast from public data to provide simplified limits insensitive to UV physics details. Future limits in the high-luminosity phase and proposed auxiliary detectors are also projected. Additionally, we study the flavor-changing neutral current (FCNC) B decays into dark pions, obtaining both current and projected constraints at the LHC and other facilities. These constraints can be combined for specific models, which are illustrated in two EW-portal benchmarks: one with the heavy doublet fermion mediation and another with the Z′ mediator including a mass mixing. The collider reach shows significant potential to probe the parameter space unconstrained by EW precision tests, highlighting the necessity of dedicated LLP search strategies and facilities.
The LHCb collaboration has recently measured the CP asymmetry in B + → J/ψπ + decay, while the Belle II collaboration has recently measured the CP asymmetries in B 0 →J/ψπ 0 decay. Within the Standard Model, and using flavor-SU(3) relations including first-order breaking corrections, these measurements lead to new predictions with regard to CP violation in B + → J/ψK + and B s → J/ψ$\bar{K}$ 0 decays, the difference between S ψK S and sin 2β, and the rate and CP asymmetries in B s → J/ψπ 0 decay.
We revisit the electric dipole moments (EDMs) of quarks and leptons in the Minimal Supersymmetric Standard Model (MSSM) with trilinear R-parity violation (RPV). In this framework, EDMs are induced at the two-loop level via RPV interactions. We perform a comprehensive recalculation of several classes of Barr-Zee type diagrams in a general Rξ gauge. While we find general agreement with previous analytic results in the literature, our work provides a valuable independent cross-check of the complicated calculations. We also point out some subtleties in the intermediate steps and in the choice of the flavor basis for the numerical evaluation of the expressions. By confronting the theoretical predictions with the latest experimental limits on EDMs, we derive updated constraints on combinations of RPV couplings. We highlight an approximate, testable correlation between the proton and neutron EDM that emerges within the considered class of RPV models, offering a distinctive signature for future EDM experiments.
The known isospin-breaking contributions to the K → ππ amplitudes are reanalyzed, taking into account our current understanding of the quark masses and the relevant non-perturbative inputs. We present a complete numerical reappraisal of the direct CP-violating ratio ϵ'/ϵ, where these corrections play a quite significant role. We obtain the Standard Model prediction Re (ϵ'/ϵ) = (14 ± 5) · 10 -4 , which is in very good agreement with the measured ratio. The uncertainty, which has been estimated conservatively, is dominated by our current ignorance about 1/N C -suppressed contributions to some relevant chiral-perturbation-theory low-energy constants.
We show that a thermal relic which decouples from the standard model (SM) plasma while relativistic can be a viable dark matter (DM) candidate, if the decoupling is followed by a period of entropy dilution that heats up the SM, but not the dark sector. Such diluted hot relics can be as light as few keV, while accounting for the entirety of the DM, and not conflicting with cosmological and astrophysical measurements. The requisite dilution can be achieved via decays of a heavy state that dominates the energy budget of the universe in the early matter dominated era. The heavy state decays into the SM particles, heats up the SM plasma, and dilutes the hidden sector. The interaction required to equilibrate the two sectors in the early universe places a bound on the maximum possible dilution as a function of the decoupling temperature. As an example of diluted hot relic DM we consider a light Dirac fermion with a heavy dark photon mediator. We present constraints on the model from terrestrial experiments (current and future), astrophysics, and cosmology.
Double electron capture by proton-rich nuclei is a second-order nuclear process analogous to double beta decay. Despite their similarities, the decay signature is quite different, potentially providing a new channel to measure the hypothesized neutrinoless mode of these decays. The Standard-Model-allowed two-neutrino double electron capture (2$\nu$EC EC) has been predicted for a number of isotopes, but only observed in 78 Kr, 130 Ba and, recently, 124 Xe. The sensitivity to this decay establishes a benchmark for the ultimate experimental goal, namely the potential to discover also the lepton-number-violating neutrinoless version of this process, 0$\nu$EC EC. Here we report on the current sensitivity of the NEXT-White detector to 124 Xe 2$\nu$EC EC and on the extrapolation to NEXT-100. Using simulated data for the 2$\nu$EC EC signal and real data from NEXT-White operated with 124 Xe-depleted gas as background, we define an optimal event selection that maximizes the NEXT-White sensitivity. We estimate that, for NEXT-100 operated with xenon gas isotopically enriched with 1 kg of 124 Xe and for a 5-year run, a sensitivity to the 2$\nu$EC EC half-life of 6 × 10 22 y (at 90% confidence level) or better can be reached.
We investigate the phase shifts of low-energy α-α scattering under variations of the fundamental parameters of the Standard Model, namely the light quark mass, the electromagnetic fine-structure constant as well as the QCD θ-angle. As a first step, we recalculate α-α scattering in our Universe utilizing various improvements in the adiabatic projection method, which leads to an improved, parameter-free prediction of the S- and D-wave phase shifts for laboratory energies below 10 MeV. We find that positive shifts in the pion mass have a small effect on the S-wave phase shift, whereas lowering the pion mass adds some repulsion in the two-alpha system. The effect on the D-wave phase shift turns out to be more pronounced as signaled by the D-wave resonance parameters. Variations of the fine-structure constant have almost no effect on the low-energy α-α phase shifts. We further show that up-to-and-including next-to-leading order in the chiral expansion, variations of these phase shifts with respect to the QCD θ-angle can be expressed in terms of the θ-dependent pion mass.