Dib Venturelli, Claudio Omar

We study the feasibility to observe sterile neutrinos with masses in the range 5 GeV

Abstract In July 2018 an optimization run for the proposed charm cross section measurement for SHiP was performed at the CERN SPS. A heavy, moving target instrumented with nuclear emulsion films followed by a silicon pixel tracker was installed in front of the Goliath magnet at the H4 proton beam-line. Behind the magnet, scintillating-fibre, drift-tube and RPC detectors were placed. The purpose of this run was to validate the measurement's feasibility, to develop the required analysis tools and fine-tune the detector layout. In this paper, we present the track reconstruction in the pixel tracker and the track matching with the moving emulsion detector. The pixel detector performed as expected and it is shown that, after proper alignment, a vertex matching rate of 87% is achieved.

The phenomenon of neutrino flavor oscillations motivates searches for sterile neutrinos in a broad range of masses and mixing-parameter values. A sterile neutrino 𝑁 that mixes predominantly with the 𝜏 neutrino is particularly challenging experimentally. To address this challenge, we propose a new method to search for a 𝜈𝜏-mixing 𝑁 that is lighter than the 𝜏 lepton. The method uses the large 𝑒+⁢𝑒−→𝜏+⁢𝜏− samples collected at 𝐵-factory experiments to produce the 𝑁 in 𝜏-lepton decays. We exploit the long lifetime of a sterile neutrino in this mass range to suppress background and apply kinematic and vertexing constraints that enable measuring the sterile-neutrino mass. Estimates for the sensitivities of the BABAR, Belle, and Belle II experiments are calculated and presented.

The Search for Hidden Particles (SHiP) experiment proposal at CERN demands a dedicated dipole magnet for its scattering and neutrino detector. This requires a very large volume to be uniformly magnetized at B > 1:2 T, with constraints regarding the inner instrumented volume as well as the external region, where no massive structures are allowed and only an extremely low stray field is admitted. In this paper we report the main technical challenges and the relevant design options providing a comprehensive design for the magnet of the SHiP Scattering and Neutrino Detector.

We implement a minimal linear seesaw model (LSM) for addressing the Quasi-Dirac (QD) behaviour of heavy neutrinos, focusing on the mass regime of MN . MW . Here we show that for relatively low neutrino masses, covering the few GeV range, the same-sign to opposite-sign dilepton ratio, R`` , can be anywhere between 0 and 1, thus signaling a Quasi-Dirac regime. Particular values of R`` are controlled by the width of the QD neutrino and its mass splitting, the latter being equal to the light-neutrino mass mν in the LSM scenario. The current upper bound on mν1 together with the projected sensitivities of current and future |UN` | 2 experimental measurements, set stringent constraints on our low-scale QD mass regime. Some experimental prospects of testing the model by LHC displaced vertex searches are also discussed.

Knowledge of the mechanism of neutrino mass generation would help understand a lot more about Lepton Number Violation (LNV), the cosmological evolution of the Universe, or the evolution of astronomical objects. Here we propose a verifiable and viable extension of the Standard model for neutrino mass generation, with a low-scale seesaw mechanism via LNV condensation in the sector of sterile neutrinos. To prove the concept, we analyze a simplified model of just a single family of elementary particles and check it against a set of phenomenological constraints coming from electroweak symmetry breaking, neutrino masses, leptogenesis and dark matter. The model predicts (i) TeV scale quasi-degenerate heavy sterile neutrinos, suitable for leptogenesis with resonant enhancement of the CP asymmetry, (ii) a set of additional heavy Higgs bosons whose existence can be challenged at the LHC, (iii) an additional light and sterile Higgs scalar which is a candidate for decaying warm dark matter, and (iv) a majoron. Since the model is based on simple and robust principles of dynamical mass generation, its parameters are very restricted, but remarkably it is still within current phenomenological limits.

Abstract We consider light neutralinos of mass about 1 GeV, produced from τ lepton rare decays at Belle II, in the context of R-parity-violating (RPV) supersymmetry. With large and clean samples of τ leptons produced at the Belle II experiment, excellent sensitivity to such light neutralinos with the exotic signatures of displaced vertices is expected. We focus on two benchmark scenarios of single RPV operators, $$ {\lambda}_{311}^{\prime }{L}_3{Q}_1{\overline{D}}_1 $$ λ 311 ′ L 3 Q 1 D ¯ 1 and $$ {\lambda}_{312}^{\prime }{L}_3{Q}_1{\overline{D}}_2 $$ λ 312 ′ L 3 Q 1 D ¯ 2 , which induce both the production and decay of the lightest neutralino. For the reconstruction of a displaced vertex, we require at least two charged pions in the final states. We perform Monte-Carlo simulations for both signal and background events, and find that Belle II can explore regions in the parameter space competitive with other probes. In particular, for the $$ {\lambda}_{311}^{\prime } $$ λ 311 ′ scenario, it can put limits up to two orders of magnitude stronger than the current bounds.

Abstract We propose a search for B meson decays to a baryon plus missing energy at the Belle II experiment to probe supersymmetry with a GeV-scale lightest neutralino $$ {\overset{\sim }{\chi}}_1^0 $$ χ ~ 1 0 and R-parity violation (RPV). We perform analytic computations of the signal branching fractions in the framework of effective field theory, with a single nonzero RPV operator $$ {\lambda}_{ij3}^{\prime \prime }{\overline{U}}_i^c{\overline{D}}_j^c{\overline{D}}_3^c $$ λ ij 3 ′ ′ U ¯ i c D ¯ j c D ¯ 3 c , where i, j = 1, 2. The hadronic form factors are calculated using an SU(3) phenomenological Lagrangian approach for the proton, as well as several hyperons and charmed baryons. Since the decay of the neutralino is kinematically and CKM suppressed in this theoretical scenario, it decays outside the detector and appears experimentally only as missing energy. We detail the analysis techniques at the experimental level and estimate the background in the $$ {B}^{+}\to p{\overset{\sim }{\chi}}_1^0 $$ B + → p χ ~ 1 0 search using published results for $$ {B}^{+}\to {K}^{+}\nu \overline{\nu} $$ B + → K + ν ν ¯ . Our final sensitivity plots are shown for both $$ {\lambda}_{113}^{\prime \prime } $$ λ 113 ′ ′ versus the squark mass $$ {m}_{\tilde{q}} $$ m q ~ and $$ {\lambda}_{113}^{\prime \prime }/{m}_{\tilde{q}}^2 $$ λ 113 ′ ′ / m q ~ 2 versus the neutralino mass $$ {m}_{{\overset{\sim }{\chi}}_1^0} $$ m χ ~ 1 0 . We find that the search at Belle II could probe $$ {\lambda}_{113}^{\prime \prime }/{m}_{\tilde{q}}^2 $$ λ 113 ′ ′ / m q ~ 2 down to the order of 10−8 GeV−2 in the kinematically allowed $$ {m}_{{\overset{\sim }{\chi}}_1^0} $$ m χ ~ 1 0 range. We also obtain current limits on $$ {\lambda}_{123}^{\prime \prime } $$ λ 123 ′ ′ by recasting an existing search interpreted as $$ {B}^0\to {\Lambda}^0{\overset{\sim }{\chi}}_1^0 $$ B 0 → Λ 0 χ ~ 1 0 , and comment about searches for $$ {B}^{+}\to {\Sigma}^{+}{\overset{\sim }{\chi}}_1^0 $$ B + → Σ + χ ~ 1 0 , $$ {B}^0\to {\Sigma}^0{\chi}_1^0 $$ B 0 → Σ 0 χ 1 0 , $$ {B}^{+}\to {\Lambda}_c^{+}{\overset{\sim }{\chi}}_1^0 $$ B + → Λ c + χ ~ 1 0 , and $$ {B}^{+}\to {\Xi}_c^{+}{\overset{\sim }{\chi}}_1^0 $$ B + → Ξ c + χ ~ 1 0 . In closing, we briefly discuss potential searches at the LHCb and BESIII experiments.