$Z$-boson decays into an invisible dark photon at the LHC, HL-LHC and future lepton colliders

Abstract

We study the decay of the $Z$ vector boson into a photon and a massless (invisible) dark photon in high-energy collisions. The photon can be used as trigger for the event, while the dark photon is detected indirectly as missing momentum in the event final state. We investigate the possibility of searching for such a dark photon at the LHC, HL-LHC and future lepton colliders, and compare the respective sensitivities. As expected, the best result is found for the lepton colliders running at the $Z$ mass, FCC-ee and CEPC, with a final sensitivity to branching ratios of order $O(10^{-11})$. We also discuss how to use the photon angular distribution of the events in lepton collisions to discriminate between the dark photon and a pseudo-scalar state like the axion.

12 pages, 8 figures, G. Panizzo corresponding author

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Cited by in corpus (6)

• The Dark Photon
• XENON1T solar axion and the Higgs boson emerging from the dark
• Tera-Zooming in on light (composite) axion-like particles
• Untangling the spin of a dark boson in $Z$ decays
• Search for invisible dark photon in $\gamma e$ scattering at future lepton colliders
• A framework for missing-energy searches with anomalous light vectors