Search

Same-sign lepton colliders offer a promising environment to probe lepton number violation. We study processes that change lepton number by two units in the context of Majorana heavy neutral leptons and neutrinophilic scalars at $\mu$TRISTAN, a proposed same-sign muon collider. Our work shows that such colliders, with modest energy and luminosity requirements, can either reveal direct evidence of lepton number violation or significantly constrain unexplored regions of parameter space, especially in the case of a neutrinophilic scalar., Comment: 7 pages, 3 figures

This work investigates the capability of future lepton colliders to determine the sign of the gauge-Higgs coupling through the vector boson fusion (VBF) $Zh$ process. This channel offers a model-independent way to probe the sign of the gauge-Higgs coupling. Its sensitivity to interference effects and universal coupling with new physics makes it particularly effective. We show that a high-energy lepton collider such as CLIC can fully determine the sign of the gauge-Higgs coupling in a model-independent way and with high confidence., Comment: 7 pages, 5 figures. Version accepted at PRD

The Belle II experiment recently observed the decay $B^+ \to K^+ \nu \nu$ for the first time, with a measured value for the branching ratio of $ (2.3 \pm 0.7) \times 10^{-5}$. This result exhibits a $\sim 3\sigma$ deviation from the Standard Model (SM) prediction. The observed enhancement with respect to the Standard Model could indicate the presence of invisible light new physics. In this paper, we investigate whether this result can be accommodated in a minimal Higgs portal model, where the SM is extended by a singlet Higgs scalar that decays invisibly to dark sector states. We find that current and future bounds on invisible decays of the 125 GeV Higgs boson completely exclude a new scalar with a mass $\gtrsim 10$ GeV. On the other hand, the Belle II results can be successfully accommodated if the new scalar is lighter than $B$ mesons but heavier than kaons. We also investigate the cosmological implications of the new states and explore the possibility that they are part of an abelian Higgs extension of the SM. Future Higgs factories are expected to place stringent bounds on the invisible branching ratio of the 125 GeV Higgs boson, and will be able to definitively test the region of parameter space favored by the Belle II results., Comment: 13 pages, 4 figures, 1 appendix

In $U(1)_R$ extensions of supersymmetric models, the bino and its Dirac partner, the singlino, can play the role of right-handed neutrinos. The bino and the singlino form a pseudo-dirac pair, dubbed the `bi$\nu$o', which can generate Standard Model neutrino masses via the inverse seesaw mechanism. We investigate the prospects for detecting long-lived bi$\nu$os at SHiP, where GeV scale bi$\nu$os can be copiously produced in the decays of mesons. We show that SHiP can probe new regions of parameter space that are complementary to searches for the lepton flavor-violating decay $\mu \to e \gamma$. This scenario provides a well-motivated benchmark for future experiments of a right-handed neutrino that mixes with all Standard Model neutrinos, and is directly related to the generation of neutrino masses., Comment: 8 pages, 2 figures

We revisit the $L_\mu - L_\tau$ extension of the Standard Model that can simultaneously address anomalies in semileptonic $B$ meson decays and the nature of dark matter (DM). In the region favored by the $B$ anomalies, this scenario is excluded by a combination of low-energy flavor constraints and stringent DM direct detection constraints if the kinetic mixing between $Z^\prime$ gauge boson and the photon vanishes at high energy scales, since this leads to a sizable coupling between DM and the SM in low-momentum scattering processes. However, this is no longer the case if the kinetic mixing vanishes at low energy scales instead. In this scenario, the low-momentum DM scattering rate can be suppressed and constraints from direct detection experiments can be substantially relaxed. As a result, we find a re-opening of the region of parameter space where the $B$ anomalies and DM can be simultaneously explained., Comment: 9 pages, 4 figures

Novel neutrino self-interaction can open up viable parameter space for the relic abundance of sterile-neutrino dark matter (S$\nu$DM). In this work, we constrain the relic target using core-collapse supernova which features the same fundamental process and a similar environment to the early universe era when S$\nu$DM is dominantly produced. We present a detailed calculation of the effects of a massive scalar mediated neutrino self-interaction on the supernova cooling rate, including the derivation of the thermal potential in the presence of non-zero chemical potentials from plasma species. Our results demonstrate that the supernova cooling argument can cover the neutrino self-interaction parameter space that complements terrestrial and cosmological probes., Comment: 22 pages, 7 Figures, 3 appendices

A new beam dump experiment that utilizes the beam of future high energy electron-positron colliders could be an excellent avenue to search for dark sector particles due to its unprecedented high energy and intensity. We consider heavy neutral leptons (HNLs) as a specific example to demonstrate the sensitivity of searches for dark sector particles at future electron-positron collider beam dump experiments. This includes the study of the reach at the International Linear Collider (ILC), the Cool Copper Collider ($\rm C^3$), and the Compact Linear Collider (CLIC). We comprehensively examine the HNL production and detector acceptance at these electron beam dump experiments. We show that these experiments will probe a large range of HNL parameter space, not yet probed by past experiments. These experiments will be complementary to other proposed experiments such as proton beam dump experiments, neutrino experiments, and LHC auxiliary detectors. Our study also motivates a more detailed analysis of heavy meson productions in high-energy electron-nucleon collisions in thick targets., Comment: v2: References added. Conclusions unchanged

The International Linear Collider (ILC) is on the table now as a new global energy-frontier accelerator laboratory taking data in the 2030s. The ILC addresses key questions for our current understanding of particle physics. It is based on a proven accelerator technology. Its experiments will challenge the Standard Model of particle physics and will provide a new window to look beyond it. This document brings the story of the ILC up to date, emphasizing its strong physics motivation, its readiness for construction, and the opportunity it presents to the US and the global particle physics community., Comment: 356 pages, Large pdf file (40 MB) submitted to Snowmass 2021; v2 references to Snowmass contributions added, additional authors; v3 references added, some updates, additional authors

High energy collisions at the High-Luminosity Large Hadron Collider (LHC) produce a large number of particles along the beam collision axis, outside of the acceptance of existing LHC experiments. The proposed Forward Physics Facility (FPF), to be located several hundred meters from the ATLAS interaction point and shielded by concrete and rock, will host a suite of experiments to probe Standard Model (SM) processes and search for physics beyond the Standard Model (BSM). In this report, we review the status of the civil engineering plans and the experiments to explore the diverse physics signals that can be uniquely probed in the forward region. FPF experiments will be sensitive to a broad range of BSM physics through searches for new particle scattering or decay signatures and deviations from SM expectations in high statistics analyses with TeV neutrinos in this low-background environment. High statistics neutrino detection will also provide valuable data for fundamental topics in perturbative and non-perturbative QCD and in weak interactions. Experiments at the FPF will enable synergies between forward particle production at the LHC and astroparticle physics to be exploited. We report here on these physics topics, on infrastructure, detector, and simulation studies, and on future directions to realize the FPF's physics potential., Comment: 429 pages, contribution to Snowmass 2021

The Forward Physics Facility (FPF), planned to operate near the ATLAS interaction point at the LHC, offers exciting new terrain to explore neutrino properties at TeV energy scales. It will reach an unprecedented regime for terrestrial neutrino experiments and provide the opportunity to reveal new physics of neutrinos at higher energy scales. We demonstrate that future detectors at the FPF have the potential to discover new mediators that couple predominantly to neutrinos, with masses between 0.3 and 20 GeV and small couplings not yet probed by existing searches. Such a neutrinophilic mediator is well motivated for addressing the origin of several neutrino-portal dark matter candidates, including thermal freeze-out and sterile-neutrino dark matter scenarios. Experimentally, the corresponding signatures include neutrino charged-current scattering events associated with large missing transverse momentum, and excessive apparent tau-neutrino events. We discuss the FPF detector capabilities needed for this search, most importantly the hadronic energy resolution., Comment: 11 pages, 6 figures

The Forward Physics Facility (FPF) is a proposal to create a cavern with the space and infrastructure to support a suite of far-forward experiments at the Large Hadron Collider during the High Luminosity era. Located along the beam collision axis and shielded from the interaction point by at least 100 m of concrete and rock, the FPF will house experiments that will detect particles outside the acceptance of the existing large LHC experiments and will observe rare and exotic processes in an extremely low-background environment. In this work, we summarize the current status of plans for the FPF, including recent progress in civil engineering in identifying promising sites for the FPF and the experiments currently envisioned to realize the FPF's physics potential. We then review the many Standard Model and new physics topics that will be advanced by the FPF, including searches for long-lived particles, probes of dark matter and dark sectors, high-statistics studies of TeV neutrinos of all three flavors, aspects of perturbative and non-perturbative QCD, and high-energy astroparticle physics., Comment: revised version, accepted by Physics Reports

The gauged $U(1)_{L_\mu-L_\tau}$ extension of the Standard Model is a very simple framework that can alleviate the tension in muon anomalous magnetic dipole moment, reinforced by the recent Fermilab measurement. We explore experimental probes of the $(g-2)_\mu$ target with a general treatment of kinetic mixing between the $Z'$ gauge boson and the photon. The physical value of the kinetic mixing depends on a free parameter of the model and energy scale of a process. We find neutrino constraints on the $(g-2)_\mu$ target including Borexino, CE$\nu$NS, and white dwarfs are sensitive to this freedom and can be lifted if the kinetic mixing lies in proximity of zero at low momentum transfer. As a further step, we explore $L_\mu-L_\tau$ charged dark matter with a thermal origin and show that the same scenario of kinetic mixing can relax existing direct detection constraints and predict novel recoil energy dependence in the upcoming searches. Future joint effort of neutrino and dark matter experiments and precision spectral measurement will be the key to test such a theory., Comment: 25 pages, 11 figures

Fixed target missing-momentum experiments such as LDMX and M$^3$ are powerful probes of light dark matter and other light, weakly coupled particles beyond the Standard Model (SM). Such experiments involve $\sim$ 10 GeV beam particles whose energy and momentum are individually measured before and after passing through a suitably thin target. If new states are radiatively produced in the target, the recoiling beam particle loses a large fraction of its initial momentum, and no SM particles are observed in a downstream veto detector. We explore how such experiments can use kinematic variables and experimental parameters, such as beam energy and polarization, to measure properties of the radiated particles and discriminate between models if a signal is discovered. In particular, the transverse momentum of recoiling particles is shown to be a powerful tool to measure the masses of new radiated states, offering significantly better discriminating ability compared to the recoil energy alone. We further illustrate how variations in beam energy, polarization, and lepton flavor (i.e., electron or muon) can be used to disentangle the possible the Lorentz structure of the new interactions., Comment: 13 pages, 10 figures, 1 appendix

Vector leptoquarks can address the lepton flavor universality anomalies in decays associated with the $b \to c \ell \nu$ and $b \to s \ell \ell$ transitions, as observed in recent years. Generically, these leptoquarks yield new sources of CP violation. In this paper, we explore constraints and discovery potential for electric dipole moments (EDMs) in leptonic and hadronic systems. We provide the most generic expressions for dipole moments induced by vector leptoquarks at one loop. We find that $O(1)$ CP-violating phases in tau and muon couplings can lead to corresponding EDMs within reach of next-generation EDM experiments, and that existing bounds on the electron EDM already put stringent constraints on CP-violating electron couplings., Comment: 36 pages, 4 figures; muon EDM projection updated, references added, conclusions unchanged

We study a version of Two Higgs Doublet Models with non-standard flavor violation in the up quark sector. We find branching ratios for the rare top decays $t\to hc$ and $t\to hu$ that are within reach of current and future colliders, while other flavor constraints from rare $B$ decays and neutral $D$ meson mixing, as well as constraints from Higgs signal strength measurements remain under control. The most prominent collider signature of the considered setup is $pp \to t H \to tt \bar c$, providing continued motivation to search for same-sign tops at the LHC as well as a simple framework to interpret these searches. As a byproduct of our study, we provide updated SM predictions for the rare top decays BR$(t \to h c)_\text{SM} = (4.19^{+1.08}_{-0.80} \pm 0.16) \times 10^{-15}$ and BR$(t \to h u)_\text{SM} = (3.66^{+0.94}_{-0.70} \pm 0.67) \times 10^{-17}$ with the main uncertainties coming from higher order QCD and CKM matrix elements., Comment: 27 pages, 3 Tables, 5 Figures

We propose a new framework to generate the Standard Model (SM) quark flavor hierarchies in the context of two Higgs doublet models (2HDM). The `flavorful' 2HDM couples the SM-like Higgs doublet exclusively to the third quark generation, while the first two generations couple exclusively to an additional source of electroweak symmetry breaking, potentially generating striking collider signatures. We synthesize the flavorful 2HDM with the `flavor-locking' mechanism, that dynamically generates large quark mass hierarchies through a flavor-blind portal to distinct flavon and hierarchon sectors: Dynamical alignment of the flavons allows a unique hierarchon to control the respective quark masses. We further develop the theoretical construction of this mechanism, and show that in the context of a flavorful 2HDM-type setup, it can automatically achieve realistic flavor structures: The CKM matrix is automatically hierarchical with $|V_{cb}|$ and $|V_{ub}|$ generically of the observed size. Exotic contributions to meson oscillation observables may also be generated, that may accommodate current data mildly better than the SM itself., Comment: 34 pages, 2 tables, 2 figures

Motivated by our limited knowledge of the Higgs couplings to first two generation fermions, we analyze the collider phenomenology of a class of two Higgs doublet models (2HDMs) with a non-standard Yukawa sector. One Higgs doublet is mainly responsible for the masses of the weak gauge bosons and the third generation fermions, while the second Higgs doublet provides mass for the lighter fermion generations. The characteristic collider signatures of this setup differ significantly from well-studied 2HDMs with natural flavor conservation, flavor alignment, or minimal flavor violation. New production mechanisms for the heavy scalar, pseudoscalar, and charged Higgs involving second generation quarks can become dominant. The most interesting decay modes include H/A -> cc, tc, {\mu}{\mu}, {\tau}{\mu} and H+ -> cb, cs, {\mu}{\nu}. Searches for low mass di-muon resonances are currently among the best probes of the heavy Higgs bosons in this setup., Comment: v4: Bug in numerics corrected. Plots updated. Conclusions unchanged