Distinguishing dark matter stabilization symmetries using multiple kinematic edges and cusps

Journal Article · Thu Jul 01 00:00:00 EDT 2010 · Physical Review. D, Particles Fields

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PHYSREVD.82.015007· OSTI ID:21410063

Agashe, Kaustubh; Kim, Doojin; Toharia, Manuel ^[1]; Walker, Devin G. E. ^[2]

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1. Maryland Center for Fundamental Physics, Department of Physics, University of Maryland, College Park, Maryland 20742 (United States)
2. Department of Physics, University of California, Berkeley, California 94720 (United States)

We emphasize that the stabilizing symmetry for dark matter (DM) particles does not have to be the commonly used parity (Z{sub 2}) symmetry. We therefore examine the potential of the colliders to distinguish models with parity stabilized DM from models in which the DM is stabilized by other symmetries. We often take the latter to be a Z{sub 3} symmetry for illustration. We focus on signatures where a single particle, charged under the DM stabilization symmetry decays into the DM and standard model (SM) particles. Such a Z{sub 3}-charged mother particle can decay into one or two DM particles along with the same SM particles. This can be contrasted with the decay of a Z{sub 2}-charged mother particle, where only one DM particle appears. Thus, if the intermediate particles in these decay chains are off-shell, then the reconstructed invariant mass of the SM particles exhibits two kinematic edges for the Z{sub 3} case but only one for the Z{sub 2} case. For the case of on-shell intermediate particles, distinguishing the two symmetries requires more than the kinematic edges. In this case, we note that certain decay chain topologies of the mother particle which are present for the Z{sub 3} case (but absent for the Z{sub 2} case) generate a cusp in the invariant mass distribution of the SM particles. We demonstrate that this cusp is generally invariant of the various spin configurations. We further apply these techniques within the context of explicit models.

• OSTI ID: 21410063
• Journal Information: Physical Review. D, Particles Fields, Vol. 82, Issue 1; Other Information: DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevD.82.015007; (c) 2010 The American Physical Society; ISSN 0556-2821
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS
CHAINS
CONFIGURATION
CUSPED GEOMETRIES
MASS
MASS DISTRIBUTION
NONLUMINOUS MATTER
PARITY
PARTICLE DECAY
PARTICLES
SPIN
STABILIZATION
STANDARD MODEL
SYMMETRY
TOPOLOGY
ANGULAR MOMENTUM
DECAY
DISTRIBUTION
FIELD THEORIES
GRAND UNIFIED THEORY
MAGNETIC FIELD CONFIGURATIONS
MATHEMATICAL MODELS
MATHEMATICS
MATTER
OPEN CONFIGURATIONS
PARTICLE MODELS
PARTICLE PROPERTIES
QUANTUM FIELD THEORY
SPATIAL DISTRIBUTION
UNIFIED GAUGE MODELS