High Energy Physics - Phenomenology (hep-ph)

Abstract: Multidimensional modification of gravity with a smaller mass scale of the gravitational interaction is considered. Stable by assumption dark matter particles could decay via interactions with virtual black holes. The decay rates of such processes are estimated. It is shown that with the proper fixation of the parameters the decays of these ultra-massive particles can give noticeable contribution to the flux of high energy cosmic rays in particular, near the Greisen-Zatsepin-Kuzmin limit. Such particles can also create neutrinos of very high energies observed in the existing huge underwater or ice-cube detectors.

Abstract: We consider the possible production of a new MeV-scale fermion at the COHERENT experiment. The new fermion, belonging to a dark sector, can be produced through the up-scattering process of neutrinos off the nuclei and the electrons of the detector material, via the exchange of a light vector or scalar mediator. We perform a detailed statistical analysis of the combined COHERENT CsI and LAr data sets and obtain up-to-date constraints on the couplings and masses of the dark fermion and mediators. We finally briefly comment about the stability of the dark fermion.

Abstract: We study the $S$-wave mass spectra of flavor exotic triply-heavy tetraquark states $cc\bar{c}\bar{q}$, $cc\bar{b}\bar{q}$, $bb\bar{c}\bar{q}$ and $bb\bar{b}\bar{q}$. We adopt a diquark-antidiquark scheme to solve Schr\"{o}dinger equation. The calculations are carried out in a nonrelativistic quark model with a color interaction described by a potential computed in AdS/QCD. The AdS/QCD potential model consists of a central potential which reflects short distance and large distance behaviour of QCD, spin dependent term for hyperfine splitting and a constant term. We find stable state candidates in the $cc\bar{c}\bar{q}$ sector whereas in the $cc\bar{b}\bar{q}$, $bb\bar{c}\bar{q}$ and $bb\bar{b}\bar{q}$ sectors all the states lie above corresponding $S$-wave meson-meson thresholds. \end{abstract}

Abstract: The present phenomenological study aims at investigating a multi-channel model for hadron interaction at high energy by considering a full parton configuration space, using the U-matrix unitarisation scheme of the elastic amplitude, comparing it to the two-channel model, and examining the consequences of up-to-date high-energy collider data on the best fits to total, elastic, inelastic, and single-diffractive cross sections for $pp$ and $p \bar{p}$ scattering. The results highlight that the data are well-fitted with the multi-channel model. Based on our best fit, predictions for the $\rho$ parameter, the ratio of the real part to the imaginary part of the elastic amplitude, the double diffractive cross-section, and the elastic differential cross-section are provided. We shed light on the effect of taking into account a multi-channel model on present and future cosmic ray data.

Abstract: Single diffractive dissociation (SDD) of nucleon in high-energy proton-proton and proton-antiproton collisions is considered in terms of a simple two-Reggeon model with nonlinear Regge trajectories. It is demonstrated that the $f$-Reggeon impact on the corresponding cross-sections is not negligible up to the LHC energies. As well, it is shown that the account of the $f$-Reggeon exchanges allows to describe the elastic diffractive scattering (EDS) and SDD of nucleons at ultrahigh energies in the framework of a unified phenomenological scheme. The predictive value of the proposed model is verified.

Abstract: Axions and axion-like-particles (ALPs) are characterised by their two-photon coupling, which entails so-called photon-ALP oscillations as photons propagate through a magnetic field. These oscillations lead to distinctive signatures in the energy spectrum of high-energy photons from astrophysical sources, allowing one to probe the existence of ALPs. In particular, photon-ALP oscillations will induce energy dependent oscillatory features, or ``ALP wiggles'', in the photon spectra. We propose to use the discrete power spectrum to search for ALP wiggles and present a model-independent statistical test. By using PKS 2155-304 as an example, we show that the method has the potential to significantly improve the experimental sensitivities for ALP wiggles. Moreover, we discuss how these sensitivities depend on the modelling of the magnetic field. We find that the use of realistic magnetic field models, due to their larger cosmic variance, substantially enhances detection prospects compared to the use of simplified models.

Abstract: Loss of unitarity in an effective field theory is often cured by the appearance of dynamical resonances, revealing the presence of new degrees of freedom. These resonances may manifest themselves when suitable unitarization techniques are implemented in the effective theory, which in the scalar-isoscalar channel require making use of the coupled-channel formalism. Conversely, experimental detection of a resonance may provide interesting information on the couplings and constants of the relevant effective theory. By applying the systematical procedure developed in previous works, we will attempt to accommodate a possible scalar resonance with mass around $650$ GeV for which there is preliminary evidence at the LHC in the vector boson fusion channel. The results are interesting: the resonance can be accommodated within the experimentally allowed range of next-to-leading order coefficients in the HEFT but in a rather non-trivial manner. Interestingly, its width and production cross section turn out to agree with the tentative experimental results.

Abstract: The discovery of new, flavor-dependent neutrino interactions would provide compelling evidence of physics beyond the Standard Model. We focus on interactions generated by the anomaly-free, gauged, abelian lepton-number symmetries, specifically $L_e-L_\mu$, $L_e-L_\tau$, and $L_\mu-L_\tau$, that introduce a new matter potential sourced by electrons and neutrons, potentially impacting neutrino flavor oscillations. We revisit, revamp, and improve the constraints on these interactions that can be placed via the flavor composition of the diffuse flux of high-energy astrophysical neutrinos, with TeV-PeV energies, i.e., the proportion of $\nu_e$, $\nu_\mu$, and $\nu_\tau$ in the flux. Because we consider mediators of these new interactions to be ultra-light, lighter than $10^{-10}$ eV, the interaction range is ultra-long, from km to Gpc, allowing vast numbers of electrons and neutrons in celestial bodies and the cosmological matter distribution to contribute to this new potential. We leverage the present-day and future sensitivity of high-energy neutrino telescopes and of oscillation experiments to estimate the constraints that could be placed on the coupling strength of these interactions. We find that, already today, the IceCube neutrino telescope demonstrates potential to constrain flavor-dependent long-range interactions significantly better than existing constraints, motivating further analysis. We also estimate the improvement in the sensitivity due to the next-generation neutrino telescopes such as IceCube-Gen2, Baikal-GVD, KM3NeT, P-ONE, and TAMBO.

Abstract: We study the production of charmed and multi-charmed hadrons in ultra-relativistic Heavy Ion Collisions coupling the transport approach for charm dynamics in the medium to an hybrid hadronization model of coalescence plus fragmentation. In this paper we discuss the particle yields for D mesons and single charmed baryons and the multi-charmed hadrons focusing mainly on the production of $\Xi_{cc}$ and $\Omega_{ccc}$. We provide predictions for PbPb collision in 0-10% centrality class and then we explore the system size dependence through KrKr, to ArAr and OO collisions. In these cases, a monotonic behavior emerges that can be tested in future experimental data. We found about three order of magnitude increase in the production of $\Omega_{ccc}$ in Pb-Pb collisions compared with the yield in small collision systems like OO collisions. Furthermore, we investigate the effects on the $\Omega_{ccc}$ particle production and spectra coming from the modification of the charm quark distribution due to the different size of the collision systems and also in the case of charm thermal distributions. These results suggest that observation on the $\Omega_{ccc}$ spectra and their evolution across system size can give information about the partial thermalization of the charm quark distribution.

Abstract: The fully charmed hadronic scalar molecules $\mathcal{M}_1=\eta_c \eta_c$ and $\mathcal{M}_2=\chi_{c0}\chi_{c0}$ are studied in the context of the QCD sum rule method. The masses $m$, $\widetilde{m}$ and current couplings $f$, $ \widetilde{f}$ of these states are calculated using the two-point sum rule approach. The obtained results $m=(6264 \pm 50)~\mathrm{MeV}$ and $ \widetilde{m}=(6954 \pm 50)~\mathrm{MeV}$ are employed to determine their decay channels. It is demonstrated that the processes $\mathcal{M}_1\to J/\psi J/\psi $ and $\mathcal{M}_1\to \eta _{c}\eta _{c}$ are kinematically allowed decay modes of $\mathcal{M}_1$. The molecule $\mathcal{M}_2$ decays to $ J/\psi J/\psi$, $J/\psi \psi^{\prime}$, $\eta _{c}\eta _{c}$, $\eta _{c}\eta _{c}(2S)$, $\eta _{c}\chi _{c1}(1P)$, and $\chi_{c0} \chi_{c0}$ mesons. The partial widths of all of these processes are evaluated by means of the three-point sum rule calculations, which are necessary to extract the strong couplings $g_i$ at vertices $\mathcal{M}_1J/\psi J/\psi $, $\mathcal{M} _1\eta _{c}\eta _{c}$, and others. Our estimates for the full widths of the molecules $\Gamma_{\mathcal{M}_1}=(320 \pm 72)~\mathrm{MeV}$ and $\Gamma _{ \mathcal{M}_2}=(138 \pm 18)~\mathrm{MeV}$, as well as their masses are compared with parameters of the scalar $X$ resonances discovered by the LHCb-ATLAS-CMS Collaborations in the di-$J/\psi$ and $J/\psi\psi^{\prime}$ invariant mass distributions. We argue that the molecule $\mathcal{M}_1$ can be considered as a real candidate to the scalar resonance $X(6200)$. The structure $\mathcal{M}_2$ may be interpreted as the resonance $X(6900)$ or treated in conjunction with a scalar tetraquark as one of its components.