Higgs Production in Neutralino Decays in the MSSM - The LHC and a Future e+e- Collider

The search for the production of weakly-interacting SUSY particles at the LHC is crucial for testing supersymmetry in relation to dark matter. Decays of neutralinos into Higgs bosons occur over some significant part of the SUSY parameter space and represent the most important source of $h$ boson production in SUSY decay chains in the MSSM. We study h production in neutralino decays using scans of the phenomenological MSSM. Whilst in constrained MSSM scenarios the decay chi^0_2 -> h chi^0_1 is the dominant channel, this does not hold in more general MSSM scenarios. On the other hand, the chi^0_2,3 -> h chi^0_1 decays remain important and are highly complementary to multi-lepton final states in the LHC searches. The perspectives for the LHC analyses at 8 and 14 TeV as well as the reach of an e+e- collider at 0.5, 1, 1.5 and 3 TeV are discussed.Comment: 11 pages, 13 figure

Supersymmetry with Light Dark Matter confronting the recent CDMS and LHC Results

We revisit MSSM scenarios with light neutralino as a dark matter candidate in view of the latest LHC and dark matter direct and indirect detection experiments. We show that scenarios with a very light neutralino (~ 10 GeV) and a scalar bottom quark close in mass, can satisfy all the available constraints from LEP, Tevatron, LHC, flavour and low energy experiments and provide solutions in agreement with the bulk of dark matter direct detection experiments, and in particular with the recent CDMS results.Comment: v2: 11 pages, 9 figures; extended study of mono-jet constraints, revised references. Two benchmark SLHA files provide

The correlation matrix of Higgs rates at the LHC

The imperfect knowledge of the Higgs boson decay rates and cross sections at the LHC constitutes a critical systematic uncertainty in the study of the Higgs boson properties. We show that the full covariance matrix between the Higgs rates can be determined from the most elementary sources of uncertainty by a direct application of probability theory. We evaluate the error magnitudes and full correlation matrix on the set of Higgs cross sections and branching ratios at $\sqrt{s}=7$, $8$, $13$ and $14$ TeV, which are provided in ancillary files. The impact of this correlation matrix on the global fits is illustrated with the latest $7$+$8$ TeV Higgs dataset.Comment: 25 pages, 1 figure. Complete covariance matrix is available in C, Fortran, Mathematica, PDF, TeX and text formats in ancillary file

One-loop quantum corrections to cosmological scalar field potentials

We study the loop corrections to potentials of complex or coupled real scalar fields used in cosmology to account for dark energy, dark matter or dark fluid. We show that the SUGRA quintessence and dark matter scalar field potentials are stable against the quantum fluctuations, and we propose solutions to the instability of the potentials of coupled quintessence and dark fluid scalar fields. We also find that a coupling to fermions is very restricted, unless this coupling has a structure which already exists in the scalar field potential or which can be compensated by higher order corrections. Finally, we study the influence of the curvature and kinetic term corrections.Comment: 11 pages, 1 figure, accepted for publication in Phys. Rev.

Supersymmetric Heavy Higgs Bosons at the LHC

The search for heavy Higgs bosons is an essential step in the exploration of the Higgs sector and in probing the Supersymmetric parameter space. This paper discusses the constraints on the M(A) and tan beta parameters derived from the bounds on the different decay channels of the neutral H and A bosons accessible at the LHC, in the framework of the phenomenological MSSM. The implications from the present LHC results and the expected sensitivity of the 14 TeV data are discussed in terms of the coverage of the [M(A) - tan beta] plane. New channels becoming important at 13 and 14 TeV for low values of tan beta are characterised in terms of their kinematics and the reconstruction strategies. The effect of QCD systematics, SUSY loop effects and decays into pairs of SUSY particles on these constraints are discussed in details.Comment: 12 pages, 18 figure

Anomaly mediated SUSY breaking scenarios in the light of cosmology and in the dark (matter)

Anomaly mediation is a popular and well motivated supersymmetry breaking scenario. Different possible detailed realisations of this set-up are studied and actively searched for at colliders. Apart from limits coming from flavour, low energy physics and direct collider searches, these models are usually constrained by the requirement of reproducing the observations on dark matter density in the universe. We reanalyse these bounds and in particular we focus on the dark matter bounds both considering the standard cosmological model and alternative cosmological scenarios. These scenarios do not change the observable cosmology but relic dark matter density bounds strongly depend on them. We consider few benchmark points excluded by standard cosmology dark matter bounds and suggest that loosening the dark matter constraints is necessary in order to avoid a too strong (cosmological) model dependence in the limits that are obtained for these models. We also discuss briefly the implications for phenomenology and in particular at the Large Hadron Collider.Comment: 37 pages, 20 figures, 1 tabl

Cosmological constraints on quintessential halos

A complex scalar field has recently been suggested to bind galaxies and flatten the rotation curves of spirals. Its cosmological behavior is thoroughly investigated here. Such a field is shown to be a potential candidate for the cosmological dark matter that fills up a fraction Omega_cdm = 0.3 of the Universe. However, problems arise when the limits from galactic dynamics and some cosmological constraints are taken simultaneously into account. A free complex field, associated to a very small mass m = 10^{-23} eV, has a correct cosmological behavior in the early Universe, but behaves today mostly as a real axion, with a problematic value of its conserved quantum number. On the other hand, an interacting field with quartic coupling lambda = 0.1 has a more realistic mass m = 1 eV and carries a quantum number close to the photon number density. Unlike a free field, it would be spinning today in the complex plane - like the so-called ``spintessence''. Unfortunately, the cosmological evolution of such field in the early Universe is hardly compatible with constraints from nucleosynthesis and structure formation.Comment: 13 pages, 3 figures. Some minor changes, version accepted in PR