Lurking pseudovectors below the TeV scale

If electroweak symmetry breaking is driven by a new strongly-coupled dynamical sector, one expects their bound states to appear at the TeV scale or slightly below. However, electroweak precision data imposes severe constraints on most of the existing models, putting them under strain. Conventional models require the new composite states to come in pairs of rather heavy, close to degenerate spin-1 resonances. In this paper I argue that spin-1 states can actually be lighter without clashing with experimental bounds. As an example, I consider a composite model with a light pseudovector resonance that couples to the Standard Model gauge boson, fermion and scalar fields. I show how such a resonance leaves basically no imprint on the NLO corrections to the Standard Model. This happens not through parameter tuning, but rather as a consequence of generic properties of realistic UV completions. This pseudovector is mostly unconstrained by existing data and could be as light as 600 GeV. In the last part of the paper I briefly discuss its most characteristic signatures for direct detection at colliders.Comment: 8 pages, 2 figure

Standard Model prediction and new physics tests for D0 -> h+h-l+l- (h=\pi,K; l=e,\mu)

Motivated by the recent evidence for direct CP-violation in D0 -> h+h- decays, we provide an exhaustive study of both Cabibbo-favored and Cabibbo-suppressed (singly and doubly) D0 -> h1+h2-l+l- decays. In particular, we study the Dalitz plot for the long-distance contributions in the (m_{ll}^2,m_{hh}^2) parameter space. We find that near-resonant effects, i.e., D0 -> V(h1+h2-)l+l- with V=\rho,K*,\phi, are sizeable and even dominant (over Bremsstrahlung) for the \mu+\mu- decay modes, bringing the branching ratios close to the LHCb reach. We also provide a detailed study of the angular asymmetries for such decays and identify signatures for new physics detection. In particular, new physics signals can be neatly isolated in asymmetries involving the semileptonic operator Q_{10}, where for typical new physics scenarios the effects can be as sizeable as O(1%) for the doubly Cabibbo-suppressed modes.Comment: 19 pages, 5 figures. v2 (journal version) contains the new subsection III.B, where the potential size of new physics effects is discussed. Tables and figures slightly changed to match the journal version. Typos corrected and references added. Conclusions unchange