Search for long-lived particles decaying to jet pairs

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Abstract

A search is presented for long-lived particles with a mass between 25 and 50 GeV$/c^2$ and a lifetime between 1 and 200 ps in a sample of proton-proton collisions at a centre-of-mass energy of $\sqrt{s}=7$ TeV, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 0.62 fb$^{-1}$, collected by the LHCb detector. The particles are assumed to be pair-produced by the decay of a Standard Model-like Higgs boson. The experimental signature of the long-lived particle is a displaced vertex with two associated jets. No excess above the background is observed and limits are set on the production cross-section as a function of the long-lived particle mass and lifetime.

Figures and captions

 Invariant mass (a) and $p_{\rm T}$ {} distribution (b) for di-jet candidates in data and in hidden valley models with \num{25}, \num{35} and 50 ${\mathrm{\,GeV\!/}c^2}$ ${\pi_v}$ masses and 10 ${\rm \,ps}$ lifetime. For visibility, the simulated signal is scaled to 0.62 $\,fb^{-1}$ assuming a Higgs cross-section of 10 $\rm \,nb$ and branching fractions of \SI{100}{%} for ${\cal B}(H\rightarrow {\pi_v} {\pi_v} )$ and ${\cal B}( {\pi_v} \rightarrow b \overline b )$. Fig1a.pdf [24 KiB] HiDef png [787 KiB] Thumbnail [125 KiB] *.C file Fig1b.pdf [28 KiB] HiDef png [946 KiB] Thumbnail [139 KiB] *.C file Distribution of the distance of the displaced vertex to the interaction region in the transverse plane for data and for a hidden valley model with $m_{ {\pi_v} } = 35 {\mathrm{\,GeV\!/}c^2}$ and $\tau_{ {\pi_v} } =10 {\rm \,ps}$ after the full selection. For visibility, the simulated signal is scaled to 0.62 $\,fb^{-1}$ assuming a Higgs cross-section of 10 $\rm \,nb$ and branching fractions of \SI{100}{%} for ${\cal B}(H\rightarrow {\pi_v} {\pi_v} )$ and ${\cal B}( {\pi_v} \rightarrow b \overline b )$. The boundaries of the intervals used in the fit are indicated by the dotted lines. The generated $R_{xy}$ {} distribution is approximately exponential with an average of about 2 $\rm \,mm$ . Fig2.pdf [22 KiB] HiDef png [488 KiB] Thumbnail [93 KiB] *.C file Di-jet invariant mass distributions for each of the five $R_{xy}$ bins, superimposed with the fits for a hidden valley model with $m_{ {\pi_v} } = 35 {\mathrm{\,GeV\!/}c^2}$ and $\tau_{ {\pi_v} } =10 {\rm \,ps}$. The blue line indicates the result of the total fit to the data. The black short-dashed line is the background-only contribution, and the red long-dashed line is the fitted signal contribution. For illustration, the green dash-dotted line shows the signal scaled to a cross-section of 17 $\rm \,pb$ , which corresponds to the SM Higgs production cross-section at 7 TeV \protec [35]. Fig3.pdf [28 KiB] HiDef png [721 KiB] Thumbnail [175 KiB] *.C file Observed \SI{95}{%} CL cross-section upper limits on a hidden valley model [6] for various ${\pi_v}$ masses, as a function of ${\pi_v}$ {} lifetime. Both ${\pi_v}$ particles are assumed to decay into $b \overline b$ , unless specified otherwise. Fig4.pdf [14 KiB] HiDef png [334 KiB] Thumbnail [73 KiB] *.C file Animated gif made out of all figures. PAPER-2014-062.gif Thumbnail

Tables and captions

 Average number of selected candidates per event (efficiency) in %{} for the main stages of the offline selection for simulated $H^0 \rightarrow {\pi_v} {\pi_v}$ events with ${\pi_v} \rightarrow b \overline b$, $m_{H^0} =120 {\mathrm{\,GeV\!/}c^2}$, $m_{ {\pi_v} } = 35 {\mathrm{\,GeV\!/}c^2}$ and $\tau_{ {\pi_v} } =10 {\rm \,ps}$. The pre-selection consists of the acceptance, trigger and offline vertex reconstruction. It represents the first stage in which the candidate yield on the total data sample, shown in the right column, can be counted. The reported uncertainty on the efficiency is only the statistical uncertainty from the finite sample size. Table_1.pdf [31 KiB] HiDef png [48 KiB] Thumbnail [7 KiB] tex code Average number of selected candidates per event (efficiency) in %{} for different ${\pi_v}$ masses, lifetimes and decay modes. The reported uncertainty is only the statistical uncertainty from the finite sample size. No simulated samples were generated for the 100 ${\rm \,ps}$ decay to light quarks. Table_2.pdf [53 KiB] HiDef png [53 KiB] Thumbnail [8 KiB] tex code Systematic uncertainties on the selection efficiency and luminosity for simulated hidden valley events with a lifetime of 10 ${\rm \,ps}$ and various ${\pi_v}$ masses. Table_3.pdf [40 KiB] HiDef png [89 KiB] Thumbnail [13 KiB] tex code Observed \SI{95}{%} CL cross-section upper limits on $\sigma(H)\times {\cal B}(H\rightarrow {\pi_v} {\pi_v} )$ (in { $\rm \,pb$ }) on a hidden valley [6] model for various ${\pi_v}$ masses and lifetimes. Both ${\pi_v}$ particles are assumed to decay into $b \overline b$ , unless specified otherwise. Table_4.pdf [43 KiB] HiDef png [71 KiB] Thumbnail [11 KiB] tex code

Supplementary Material [file]

 Supplementary material full pdf supple[..].pdf [255 KiB] Fig1a-S.pdf [10 KiB] HiDef png [382 KiB] Thumbnail [82 KiB] *C file Fig1b-S.pdf [10 KiB] HiDef png [399 KiB] Thumbnail [82 KiB] *C file Fig1c-S.pdf [10 KiB] HiDef png [390 KiB] Thumbnail [80 KiB] *C file Fig1d-S.pdf [10 KiB] HiDef png [374 KiB] Thumbnail [78 KiB] *C file Fig2-S.pdf [13 KiB] HiDef png [188 KiB] Thumbnail [34 KiB] *C file

Created on 16 February 2019.Citation count from INSPIRE on 21 February 2019.