Probing the Dark Sector through Mono-Z Boson Leptonic Decays

Collider search for dark matter production has been performed over the years based on high pT standard model signatures balanced by large missing transverse energy. The mono-Z boson production with leptonic decay has a clean signature with the advantage that the decaying electrons and muons can be precisely measured. This signature not only enables reconstruction of the Z boson rest frame, but also makes possible recovery of the underlying production dynamics through the decaying lepton angular distribution. In this work, we exploit full information carried by the leptonic Z boson decays to set limits on coupling strength parameters of the dark sector. We study simplified dark sector models with scalar, vector, and tensor mediators and observe among them different signatures in the distribution of angular coefficients.Specifically, we show that angular coefficients can be used to distinguish different scenarios of the spin-0 and spin-1 models, including the ones with parity-odd and charge conjugation parity-odd operators. To maximize the statistical power, we perform a matrix element method study with a dynamic construction of event likelihood function. We parametrize the test statistic such that sensitivity from the matrix element is quantified through a term measuring the shape difference. Our results show that the shape differences provide significant improvements in the limits, especially for the scalar mediator models. We also present an example application of a matrix-element-kinematic-discriminator, an easier approach that is applicable for experimental data.Comment: 26 pages, 16 figure

Soft Gluon Resummation Effects in Single Graviton Production at the CERN Large Hadron Collider in the Randall-Sundrum Model

We study QCD effects in single graviton production at the CERN Large Hadron Collider (LHC) in the Randall-Sundrum (RS) Model. We present in detail the complete next-to-leading order (NLO) QCD corrections to the inclusive total cross sections. The NLO QCD corrections enhance significantly the total cross sections and decrease efficiently the dependence of the total cross sections on the factorization and renormalization scales. We also examine the uncertainty of the total cross sections due to the parton distribution function (PDF) uncertainties. For the differential cross sections on the transverse momentum ($q_T$) of the graviton, within the CSS resummation formalism, we resum the logarithmically-enhanced terms at small $q_T$ to all orders up to NLO logatithmic accuracy. Combined with the fixed order calculations, we give consistent predictions for both small $q_T$ and large $q_T$.Comment: 26 pages, 13 figures; minor changes and misprints corrected; version to appear in PR

Revisiting B\to\pi K, \pi K^{\ast} and \rho K decays: CP violations and implication for New Physics

Combining the up-to-date experimental information on $B\to\pi K, \pi K^{\ast}$ and $\rho K$ decays, we revisit the decay rates and CP asymmetries of these decays within the framework of QCD factorization. Using an infrared finite gluon propagator of Cornwall prescription, we find that the time-like annihilation amplitude could contribute a large strong phase, while the space-like hard spectator scattering amplitude is real. Numerically, we find that all the branching ratios and most of the direct CP violations, except $A_{CP}(B^{\pm}\to K^{\pm}\pi^{0})$, agree with the current experimental data with an effective gluon mass $m_g\simeq0.5 {\rm GeV}$. Taking the unmatched difference in direct CP violations between $B\to\pi^{0} K^{\pm}$ and $\pi^{\mp}K^{\pm}$ decays as a hint of new physics, we perform a model-independent analysis of new physics contributions with a set of $\bar{s}(1+\gamma_{5})b\otimes\bar{q}(1+\gamma_{5})q$ (q=u,d) operators. Detail analyses of the relative impacts of the operators are presented in five cases. Fitting the twelve decay modes, parameter spaces are found generally with nontrivial weak phases. Our results may indicate that both strong phase from annihilation amplitude and new weak phase from new physics are needed to resolve the $\pi K$ puzzle. To further test the new physics hypothesis, the mixing-induced CP violations in $B\to\pi^{0}K_{S}$ and $\rho^{0}K_{S}$ are discussed and good agreements with the recent experimental data are found.Comment: Version published in JHE

Λb→Λcτνˉτ\Lambda_b\to\Lambda_c\tau\bar\nu_\tau decay in scalar and vector leptoquark scenarios

It has been shown that the anomalies observed in $\bar B\to D^{(\ast)}\tau\bar\nu_\tau$ and $\bar B\to \bar K\ell^+\ell^-$ decays can be resolved by adding a single scalar or vector leptoquark to the Standard Model, while constraints from other precision measurements in the flavour sector can be satisfied without fine-tuning. To further explore these two interesting scenarios, in this paper, we study their effects in the semi-leptonic $\Lambda_b\to\Lambda_c\tau\bar\nu_\tau$ decay. Using the best-fit solutions for the operator coefficients allowed by the current data of mesonic decays, we find that (i) the two scenarios give similar amounts of enhancements to the branching fraction $\mathcal B(\Lambda_b\to\Lambda_c\tau\bar\nu_\tau)$ and the ratio $R_{\Lambda_c}=\mathcal B(\Lambda_b\to\Lambda_c \tau\bar\nu_\tau)/\mathcal B(\Lambda_b\to\Lambda_c\ell\bar\nu_\ell)$, (ii) the two best-fit solutions in each of these two scenarios are also indistinguishable from each other, (iii) both scenarios give nearly the same predictions as those of the Standard Model for the longitudinal polarizations of $\Lambda_c$ and $\tau$ as well as the lepton-side forward-backward asymmetry. With future measurements of these observables in $\Lambda_b\to\Lambda_c\tau\bar\nu_\tau$ decay at the LHCb, the two leptoquark scenarios could be further tested, and even differentiated from the other NP explanations for the $R_{D^{(\ast)}}$ anomalies. We also discuss the feasibility for the measurements of these observables at the LHC and the future $e^+e^-$ colliders.Comment: 29 pages, 4 tables and 2 figures; More references and the feasibility for the measurements of the observables in these decays at the LHC and the future $e^+e^-$ colliders added, final version published in the journa