Calculating two- and three-body decays with FeynArts and FormCalc

The Feynman diagram generator FeynArts and the computer algebra program FormCalc allow for an automatic computation of 2->2 and 2->3 scattering processes in High Energy Physics. We have extended this package by four new kinematical routines and adapted one existing routine in order to accomodate also two- and three-body decays of massive particles. This makes it possible to compute automatically two- and three-body particle decay widths and decay energy distributions as well as resonant particle production within the Standard Model and the Minimal Supersymmetric Standard Model at the tree- and loop-level. The use of the program is illustrated with three standard examples: h->b\bar{b}, \mu->e\bar{\nu}_e\nu_\mu, and Z->\nu_e\bar{\nu}_e.Comment: 8 pages, 1 figur

Counting dark matter particles in LHC events

We suggest trying to count the number of invisible particles produced in missing energy events at the LHC, arguing that multiple production of such particles provides evidence that they constitute stable Dark Matter and that counting them could yield further insights into the nature of Dark Matter. We propose a method to count invisible particles, based on fitting the shapes of certain transverse- or invariant-mass distributions, discuss various effects that may affect the measurement, and simulate the use of the method to count neutrinos in Standard Model processes and Dark Matter candidates in new physics processes.Comment: 18 pages, 13 figures, revtex4 forma

ppbar enhancement in B and J/Psi decay

The near-threshold enhancement in the ppbar invariant mass spectrum from the B^+ -> K^+ ppbar decay reported recently by the BaBar Collaboration is studied within the J\"ulich NNbar model. We illustrate that the invariant mass dependence of the ppbar spectrum close to the threshold can be reproduced by the final state interactions. This explanation is in line with our previous analysis of the ppbar invariant mass spectrum from the J/Psi -> gamma ppbar decay measured by the BES Collaboration. We also comment on a structure found recently in the pi^+ pi^- eta' mass spectrum of the radiative J/Psi decay by the BES Collaboration. In particular we argue that one should be rather cautions in bringing this structure in connection with the enhancement found in the ppbar invariant mass spectrum or with the existence of NNbar bound states.Comment: 4 pp, 2 figs, uses revtex

Probing resonance decays to two visible and multiple invisible particles

We consider the decay of a generic resonance to two visible particles and any number of invisible particles. We show that the shape of the invariant mass distribution of the two visible particles is sensitive to both the mass spectrum of the new particles, as well as the decay topology. We provide the analytical formulas describing the invariant mass shapes for the nine simplest topologies (with up to two invisible particles in the final state). Any such distribution can be simply categorized by its endpoint, peak location and curvature, which are typically sufficient to discriminate among the competing topologies. In each case, we list the effective mass parameters which can be measured by experiment. In certain cases, the invariant mass shape is sufficient to completely determine the new particle mass spectrum, including the overall mass scale.Comment: Added new figures, conclusions unchanged, published versio

Thermalization of gluons in ultrarelativistic heavy ion collisions by including three-body interactions in a parton cascade

We develop a new 3+1 dimensional Monte Carlo cascade solving the kinetic on-shell Boltzmann equations for partons including the inelastic gg ggg pQCD processes. The back reaction channel is treated -- for the first time -- fully consistently within this scheme. An extended stochastic method is used to solve the collision integral. The frame dependence and convergency are studied for a fixed tube with thermal initial conditions. The detailed numerical analysis shows that the stochastic method is fully covariant and that convergency is achieved more efficiently than within a standard geometrical formulation of the collision term, especially for high gluon interaction rates. The cascade is then applied to simulate parton evolution and to investigate thermalization of gluons for a central Au+Au collision at RHIC energy. For this study the initial conditions are assumed to be generated by independent minijets with p_T > p_0=2 GeV. With that choice it is demonstrated that overall kinetic equilibration is driven mainly by the inelastic processes and is achieved on a scale of 1 fm/c. The further evolution of the expanding gluonic matter in the central region then shows almost an ideal hydrodynamical behavior. In addition, full chemical equilibration of the gluons follows on a longer timescale of about 3 fm/c.Comment: 121 pages with 55 figures, revised version. Two eps-figures and comments are added. Formula (54) which has typo in journal version is given correctl

Proton Lifetime and Baryon Number Violating Signatures at the LHC in Gauge Extended Models

There exist a number of models in the literature in which the weak interactions are derived from a chiral gauge theory based on a larger group than SU(2)_L x U(1)_Y. Such theories can be constructed so as to be anomaly-free and consistent with precision electroweak measurements, and may be interpreted as a deconstruction of an extra dimension. They also provide interesting insights into the issues of flavor and dynamical electroweak symmetry breaking, and can help to raise the mass of the Higgs boson in supersymmetric theories. In this work we show that these theories can also give rise to baryon and lepton number violating processes, such as nucleon decay and spectacular multijet events at colliders, via the instanton transitions associated with the extended gauge group. For a particular model based on SU(2)_1 x SU(2)_2, we find that the $B+L$ violating scattering cross sections are too small to be observed at the LHC, but that the lower limit on the lifetime of the proton implies an upper bound on the gauge couplings.Comment: 36 page

A Numerical Unitarity Formalism for Evaluating One-Loop Amplitudes

Recent progress in unitarity techniques for one-loop scattering amplitudes makes a numerical implementation of this method possible. We present a 4-dimensional unitarity method for calculating the cut-constructible part of amplitudes and implement the method in a numerical procedure. Our technique can be applied to any one-loop scattering amplitude and offers the possibility that one-loop calculations can be performed in an automatic fashion, as tree-level amplitudes are currently done. Instead of individual Feynman diagrams, the ingredients for our one-loop evaluation are tree-level amplitudes, which are often already known. To study the practicality of this method we evaluate the cut-constructible part of the 4, 5 and 6 gluon one-loop amplitudes numerically, using the analytically known 4, 5 and 6 gluon tree-level amplitudes. Comparisons with analytic answers are performed to ascertain the numerical accuracy of the method.Comment: 29 pages with 8 figures; references updated in rsponse to readers' suggestion

Dimuon production by laser-wakefield accelerated electrons

We analyze $\mu^+\mu^-$ pair production generated by high-energy electrons emerging from a laser-wakefield accelerator. The $\mu^+\mu^-$ pairs are created in a solid thick high-$Z$ target, following the electron accelerating plasma region. Numerical estimates are presented for electron beams obtained presently in the LBL TW laser experiment \cite{C2} and possible future developments. Reactions induced by the secondary bremsstrahlung photons dominate the dimuon production. According to our estimates, a 20 pC electron bunch with energy of 1 (10) GeV may create about 200 (6000) muon pairs. The produced $\mu^\pm$ can be used in studying various aspects of muon-related physics in table top installations. This may be considered as an important step towards the investigation of more complicated elementary processes induced by laser driven electrons.Comment: 14 pages, 5 figure

TeV Scale Seesaw and a flavorful Z' at the LHC

Small neutrino masses and their large mixing angles can be generated at the TeV scale by augmenting the Standard Model with an additional generation dependent, anomaly-free U(1)_{nu} symmetry, in the presence of three right-handed neutrinos. The Z' gauge boson associated with the breaking of the U(1)_{nu} symmetry can be produced at the LHC. The flavorful nature of the Z' can be established by measuring its non-universal couplings to the charged leptons as determined by the lepton's U(1)_{nu} charges, which also govern the neutrino flavor structure. While the LHC has the potential of discovering the Z' up to M_{Z'} = 4.5 TeV with 100 fb^(-1) data at the center of mass energy sqrt{s} = 14 TeV, to establish the flavorful nature of the Z' requires much higher integrated luminosity. For our bench mark parameters that are consistent with neutrino oscillation data, at sqrt{s} = 14 TeV, a 5 sigma distinction between the dielectron and dimuon channels for M_{Z'} = 3 TeV requires 500 fb^(-1) of data. We find that the forward backward asymmetry distributions can also be useful in distinguishing the dielectron and dimuon channels in the low invariant mass and transverse momentum regions.Comment: 9 pages, 13 figures; v2: version to appear in Phys. Rev.

Heavy boson production through the collision of an ultrahigh-energy neutrino on a target nucleon

We discuss W and Z production through the deep inelastic neutrino-nucleon scattering in the context of the standard model SU(3)x SU(2)x U(1) of the strong and electroweak interactions. We find the cross section rates for the process neutrino + nucleon --> lepton(-) + W(+) + X for the case of ultrahigh-energy neutrinos colliding on a target nucleon.Comment: 20 pages, 6 figure