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At least 163 records · Page 9
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2020

Leptonic scalars at the LHC

We explore the collider prospects of neutrino non-standard interaction with a Standard Model (SM) gauge-singlet leptonic scalar ϕ carrying two units of lepton-number-charge. These leptonic scalars are forbidden from interacting with the SM fermions at the renormalizable level and, if one allows for higher-dimensional operators, couple predominantly to SM neutrinos. For masses at or below the electroweak scale, ϕ decays exclusively into neutrinos. Its characteristic production signature at hadron collider experiments like the LHC would be via the vector boson fusion process and leads to same-sign dileptons, two forward jets in opposite hemispheres, and missing transverse energy, i.e., $$ pp\to {\mathrm{\ell}}_{\alpha}^{\pm }{\mathrm{\ell}}_{\beta}^{\pm } jj+{E}_T^{\mathrm{miss}}\left(\alpha, \beta =e,\mu, \tau \right) $$ pp → ℓ α ± ℓ β ± jj + E T miss α β = e μ τ . Exploiting the final states of electrons and muons, we estimate, for the first time, the sensitivity of the LHC to these lepton-number-charged scalars. We show that the LHC sensitivity is largely complementary to that of low-energy precision measurements of the decays of charged leptons, charged mesons, W , Z and the SM Higgs boson, as well as the neutrino beam experiments like MINOS, and searches for neutrino self-interactions at IceCube and in cosmological observations. For ϕ mass larger than roughly 10 GeV, our projected LHC sensitivity would surpass all existing bounds.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗
DOE OSTI2020

Electric dipole moments in a leptoquark scenario for the B-physics anomalies

Vector leptoquarks can address the lepton flavor universality anomalies in decays associated with the b → cℓν and b → sℓℓ transitions, as observed in recent years. While not required to explain the anomalies, these leptoquarks generically 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.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2025

Rare Lepton Decays and Differentiable Hadronization Models - From Signatures of New Physics to Data-driven Event Generation

This dissertation is partitioned into two parts: phenomenological studies focused on rare lepton decays as probes of heavy and light new physics, and the development of differentiable, data-driven hadronization models. Part I develops the phenomenology of new physics signatures stemming from rare charged lepton flavor violating decays probed by experiments at the intensity frontier. These include interactions mediated by both high-scale effective operators and light new physics, manifesting in multi-lepton final states ($\mu \to 5e$), elastic nuclear transitions ($\mu \to e$ conversion), baryon-number-violating muon capture, and time-dependent signals from ultralight dark matter ($\mu \to e \phi, \tau \to \ell \phi$). Part II develops two distinct strategies for advancing differentiable and data-driven hadronization models. One involves comprehensive reweighting frameworks for hadronization that enable efficient uncertainty estimation, facilitate parameter tuning, and interface naturally with differentiable programming paradigms. The other introduces machine-learning-based methods for extracting microscopic fragmentation dynamics directly from macroscopic observables through the deformation of existing models -- effectively providing solutions to the inverse problem of hadronization. Altogether, these studies advance the interpretability, flexibility, and precision of theoretical predictions for both high-intensity and high-energy experiments.

Menzo, Tony [Cincinnati U.] (ORCID:000000022013457↗
DOE OSTI2022

Analysis of a tau neutrino origin for the near-horizon air shower events observed by the fourth flight of the Antarctic Impulsive Transient Antenna

In this work, we study in detail the sensitivity of the Antarctic Impulsive Transient Antenna (ANITA) to possible ν τ point source fluxes detected via τ-lepton-induced air showers. This investigation is framed around the observation of four upward-going extensive air shower events very close to the horizon seen in ANITA-IV. We find that these four upgoing events are not observationally inconsistent with τ-induced EASs from Earth-skimming ν τ both in their spectral properties as well as in their observed locations on the sky. These four events as well as the overall diffuse and point source exposure to Earth-skimming ν τ are also compared against published ultrahigh-energy neutrino limits from the Pierre Auger Observatory. While none of these four events occurred at sky locations simultaneously visible by Auger, the implied fluence necessary for ANITA to observe these events is in strong tension with limits set by Auger across a wide range of energies and is additionally in tension with ANITA’s Askaryan in-ice neutrino channel above 10 19 eV. We conclude by discussing some of the technical challenges with simulating and analyzing these near horizon events and the potential for future observatories to observe similar events.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2021

Electron-beam energy reconstruction for neutrino oscillation measurements

Neutrinos exist in one of three types or ‘flavours’—electron, muon and tau neutrinos—and oscillate from one flavour to another when propagating through space. This phenomena is one of the few that cannot be described using the standard model of particle physics (reviewed in ref. 1), and so its experimental study can provide new insight into the nature of our Universe (reviewed in ref. 2). Neutrinos oscillate as a function of their propagation distance (L) divided by their energy (E). Therefore, experiments extract oscillation parameters by measuring their energy distribution at different locations. As accelerator-based oscillation experiments cannot directly measure E, the interpretation of these experiments relies heavily on phenomenological models of neutrino–nucleus interactions to infer E. Here we exploit the similarity of electron–nucleus and neutrino–nucleus interactions, and use electron scattering data with known beam energies to test energy reconstruction methods and interaction models. We find that even in simple interactions where no pions are detected, only a small fraction of events reconstruct to the correct incident energy. More importantly, widely used interaction models reproduce the reconstructed energy distribution only qualitatively and the quality of the reproduction varies strongly with beam energy. This shows both the need and the pathway to improve current models to meet the requirements of next-generation, high-precision experiments such as Hyper-Kamiokande (Japan) and DUNE (USA).

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2022

Measurement of the energy response of the ATLAS calorimeter to charged pions from $W^{\pm }\rightarrow \tau ^{\pm }(\rightarrow \pi ^{\pm }\nu _{\tau })\nu _{\tau }$ events in Run 2 data

The energy response of the ATLAS calorimeter is measured for single charged pions with transverse momentum in the range 10 < p T < 300 GeV. The measurement is performed using 139 fb –1 of LHC proton–proton collision data at √s = 13 TeV taken in Run 2 by the ATLAS detector. Charged pions originating from τ-lepton decays are used to provide a sample of high-p T isolated particles, where the composition is known, to test an energy regime that has not previously been probed by in situ single-particle measurements. The calorimeter response to single-pions is observed to be overestimated by ~2% across a large part of the p T spectrum in the central region and underestimated by ~4% in the endcaps in the ATLAS simulation. The uncertainties in the measurements are ≲1% for 15 < p T < 185 GeV in the central region. To investigate the source of the discrepancies, the width of the distribution of the ratio of calorimeter energy to track momentum, the energies per layer and response in the hadronic calorimeter are also compared between data and simulation.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2023

Probing lepton flavor violation at Circular Electron-Positron Colliders

Lepton flavor violation is one of the cleanest probes of physics beyond the standard model. In this work, we explore the sensitivity of the process e + e – → τμ to new physics above the TeV scale at the proposed circular electron-positron colliders FCC-ee and CEPC. We compute the e + e – → τμ cross-section in the Standard Model Effective Field Theory and assess the relevant backgrounds. We compare our sensitivity projections to existing and expected constraints from tau decays and Z decays and find that the future electron-positron colliders provide competitive probes of new physics. We highlight the complementarity of searches for resonant e + e – → Z → τμ production on the Z pole and searches for non-resonant e + e – → τμ at higher center-of-mass energies.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2024

Search for lepton-flavor-violating τ – → μ – μ + μ – decays at Belle II

We present the result of a search for the charged-lepton-flavor violating decay τ – → μ – μ + μ – using a 424 fb –1 sample of data recorded by the Belle II experiment at the SuperKEKB e + e – collider. The selection of e + e – → τ + τ – events is based on an inclusive reconstruction of the non-signal tau decay, and on a boosted decision tree to suppress background. We observe one signal candidate, which is compatible with the expectation from background processes. We set a 90% confidence level upper limit of 1.9 × 10 –8 on the branching fraction of the τ – → μ – μ + μ – decay, which is the most stringent bound to date.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2023

Probing lepton flavor violation in meson decays with LHC data

Abstract In this letter, we use LHC data from the Drell–Yan processes $$pp\rightarrow \ell _i\ell _j$$ p p → ℓ i ℓ j (with $$i\ne j$$ i ≠ j ) to derive model-independent upper limits on lepton-flavor-violating meson decays. Our analysis is based on an Effective Field Theory (EFT) approach and it does not require a specific assumption regarding the basis of effective operators. We find that current LHC data (140 $$\textrm{fb}^{-1}$$ fb - 1 ) already provides competitive limits on $${\mathcal {B}}(B\rightarrow \pi e \tau )$$ B ( B → π e τ ) and $${\mathcal {B}}(B\rightarrow \pi \mu \tau )$$ B ( B → π μ τ ) with respect to the ones obtained through experimental searches at the B -factories. Moreover, we derive upper limits on several decays that have not been searched for experimentally yet, such as $$D^0\rightarrow e\tau $$ D 0 → e τ in the charm sector, and various semileptonic decays such as $$B\rightarrow \rho \mu \tau $$ B → ρ μ τ , $$B_s\rightarrow K \mu \tau $$ B s → K μ τ and $$B_s\rightarrow \phi \mu \tau $$ B s → ϕ μ τ . Lastly, we discuss the validity of the EFT description of LHC data and the impact of loop corrections in our analysis.

Descotes-Genon, S.↗
DOE OSTI2021

Supersymmetric gauged $ \mathrm{U}{(1)}_{L_{\mu }-{L}_{\tau }} $ model for electron and muon (g - 2) anomaly

Minimal gauged U 1 L μ - L τ models can provide for an additional source for the muon anomalous magnetic moment however it is difficult to accommodate the discrepancy in the electron magnetic moment in tandem. Owing to the relative sign between the discrepancies in these quantities, it seems unlikely that they arise from the same source. We show that a supersymmetric (SUSY) gauged U 1 L μ - L τ model can accommodate both the muon and electron anomalous magnetic moments in a very simple and intuitive scenario, without utilizing lepton flavor violation. The currently allowed parameter space in this kind of a scenario is constrained from the latest LHC and various low energy experimental data,e.g., recent COHERENT data, CCFR, Borexino, BaBaR, supernova etc. These constraints, in conjunction with the requirement to explain both lepton magnetic moments, lead to an upper bound on the first generation slepton mass, a lower bound on the second generation slepton mass and constricts the allowed range for the new gauge boson mass and coupling. The scheme can be probed at the ongoing COHERENT and Coherent CAPTAIN-Mills experiments and at future experiments, e.g., DUNE, BELLE-II etc.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗
DOE OSTI2020

Search for a light pseudoscalar Higgs boson in the boosted $\mu\mu\tau\tau$ final state in proton-proton collisions at $\sqrt{s}=$ 13 TeV

A search for a light pseudoscalar Higgs boson (a) decaying from the 125 GeV (or a heavier) scalar Higgs boson (H) is performed using the 2016 LHC proton-proton collision data at $ \sqrt{s} $ = 13 TeV, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 35.9 fb$^{−1}$, collected by the CMS experiment. The analysis considers gluon fusion and vector boson fusion production of the H, followed by the decay H → aa → μμττ, and considers pseudoscalar masses in the range 3.6 < m$_{a}$< 21 GeV. Because of the large mass difference between the H and the a bosons and the small masses of the a boson decay products, both the μμ and the ττ pairs have high Lorentz boost and are collimated. The ττ reconstruction efficiency is increased by modifying the standard technique for hadronic τ lepton decay reconstruction to account for a nearby muon. No significant signal is observed. Model-independent limits are set at 95% confidence level, as a function of m$_{a}$, on the branching fraction (ℬ) for H → aa → μμττ, down to 1.5 (2.0) × 10$^{−4}$ for m$_{H}$ = 125 (300) GeV. Model-dependent limits on ℬ(H → aa) are set within the context of two Higgs doublets plus singlet models, with the most stringent results obtained for Type-III models. These results extend current LHC searches for heavier a bosons that decay to resolved lepton pairs and provide the first such bounds for an H boson with a mass above 125 GeV.[graphic not available: see fulltext]

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2024

Search for electroweak production of supersymmetric particles in final states with two τ -leptons in $\sqrt{s}$ = 13 TeV pp collisions with the ATLAS detector

Three searches for the direct production of τ-sleptons or charginos and neutralinos in final states with at least two hadronically decaying τ-leptons are presented. For chargino and neutralino production, decays via intermediate τ-sleptons or W and h bosons are considered. The analysis uses a dataset of pp collisions corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 139 fb -1 , recorded with the ATLAS detector at the Large Hadron Collider at a centre-of-mass energy of 13 TeV. No significant deviation from the expected Standard Model background is observed and supersymmetric particle mass limits at 95% confidence level are obtained in simplified models. For direct production of $\sim\atop{\chi}$ $^+_1$ $\sim\atop{\chi}$ $^-_1$, chargino masses are excluded up to 970 GeV, while $\sim\atop{\chi}$ $^±_1$ and $\sim\atop{\chi}$ $^0_2$ masses up to 1160 GeV (330 GeV) are excluded for $\sim\atop{\chi}$ $^±_1$ $\sim\atop{\chi}$ $^0_2$ / $\sim\atop{\chi}$ $^+_1$ $\sim\atop{\chi}$ $^-_1$ production with subsequent decays via τ-sleptons (W and h bosons). Masses of τ-sleptons up to 500 GeV are excluded for mass degenerate $\sim\atop{\tau}$ L,R scenarios and up to 425 GeV for $\sim\atop{\tau}$ L-only scenarios. Sensitivity to $\sim\atop{\tau}$ R -only scenarios from the ATLAS experiment is presented here for the first time, with $\sim\atop{\tau}$ R masses excluded up to 350 GeV.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2020

Search for heavy neutral leptons decaying into muon-pion pairs in the MicroBooNE detector

We present upper limits on the production of heavy neutral leptons (HNLs) decaying to $\mu \pi$ pairs using data collected with the MicroBooNE liquid-argon time projection chamber (TPC) operating at Fermilab. This search is the first of its kind performed in a liquid-argon TPC. We use data collected in 2017 and 2018 corresponding to an exposure of $2.0 \times 10^{20}$ protons on target from the Fermilab Booster Neutrino Beam, which produces mainly muon neutrinos with an average energy of $\approx 800$ MeV. HNLs with higher mass are expected to have a longer time-of-flight to the liquid-argon TPC than Standard Model neutrinos. The data are therefore recorded with a dedicated trigger configured to detect HNL decays that occur after the neutrino spill reaches the detector. We set upper limits at the $90\%$ confidence level on the element $\lvert U_{\mu4}\rvert^2$ of the extended PMNS mixing matrix in the range $\lvert U_{\mu4}\rvert^2<(6.6$-$0.9)\times 10^{-7}$ for Dirac HNLs and $\lvert U_{\mu4}\rvert^2<(4.7$-$0.7)\times 10^{-7}$ for Majorana HNLs, assuming HNL masses between $260$ and $385$ MeV and $\lvert U_{e 4}\rvert^2 = \lvert U_{\tau 4}\rvert^2 = 0$.

46 INSTRUMENTATION RELATED TO NUCLEAR SCIENCE AND ↗
DOE OSTI2021

Improved Neutron Lifetime Measurement with UCN$\tau$

In this work, we report an improved measurement of the free neutron lifetime $\tau_n$ using the UCN$\tau$ apparatus at the Los Alamos Neutron Science Center. We count a total of approximately 38×10 6 surviving ultracold neutrons (UCNs) after storing in UCN$\tau$’s magnetogravitational trap over two data acquisition campaigns in 2017 and 2018. We extract $\tau$ n from three blinded, independent analyses by both pairing long and short storage time runs to find a set of replicate $\tau$ n measurements and by performing a global likelihood fit to all data while self-consistently incorporating the β-decay lifetime. Both techniques achieve consistent results and find a value $\tau$ n =877.75±0.28 stat +0.22/–0.16 syst s. With this sensitivity, neutron lifetime experiments now directly address the impact of recent refinements in our understanding of the standard model for neutron decay.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2024

Test of light-lepton universality in τ decays with the Belle II experiment

We present a measurement of the ratio R µ = $\mathcal{B}$($τ^- → µ^-\overline{ν}_µν_τ$)/$\mathcal{B}(τ^- → e^-\overline{ν}_eν_τ$) of branching fractions B of the τ lepton decaying to muons or electrons using data collected with the Belle II detector at the SuperKEKB e + e - collider. The sample has an integrated luminosity of 362 ± 2 fb -1 at a centre-of-mass energy of 10.58 GeV. Using an optimised event selection, a binned maximum likelihood ft is performed using the momentum spectra of the electron and muon candidates. The result, R µ = 0.9675 ± 0.0007 ± 0.0036, where the first uncertainty is statistical and the second is systematic, is the most precise to date. It provides a stringent test of the light-lepton universality, translating to a ratio of the couplings of the muon and electron to the W boson in τ decays of 0.9974 ± 0.0019, in agreement with the standard model expectation of unity.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2023

Search for third-generation vector-like leptons in $pp$ collisions at $\sqrt{s}$ = 13 TeV with the ATLAS detector

A search for vector-like leptons in multilepton (two, three, or four-or-more electrons plus muons) final states with zero or more hadronic $τ$-lepton decays is presented. The search is performed using a dataset corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 139 fb -1 of proton-proton collisions at a centre-of-mass energy of 13 TeV recorded by the ATLAS detector at the LHC. To maximize the separation of signal and background, a machine-learning classifier is used. No excess of events is observed beyond the Standard Model expectation. Using a doublet vector-like lepton model, vector-like leptons coupling to third-generation Standard Model leptons are excluded in the mass range from 130 GeV to 900 GeV at the 95% confidence level, while the highest excluded mass is expected to be 970 GeV.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2022

Analysis of the CP structure of the Yukawa coupling between the Higgs boson and τ leptons in proton-proton collisions at $\sqrt{s}$ = 13 TeV

The first measurement of the CP structure of the Yukawa coupling between the Higgs boson and τ leptons is presented. The measurement is based on data collected in proton-proton collisions at s√ = 13 TeV by the CMS detector at the LHC, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 137 fb -1 . Our analysis uses the angular correlation between the decay planes of τ leptons produced in Higgs boson decays. The effective mixing angle between CP-even and CP-odd τ Yukawa couplings is found to be -1 ± 19°, compared to an expected value of 0 ± 21° at the 68.3% confidence level. The data disfavour the pure CP-odd scenario at 3.0 standard deviations. The results are compatible with predictions for the standard model Higgs boson.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗