High Energy Physics Seminars

From theory to observation in the LHC era: a case study of DM search with soft displaced leptons

by Dr. Nishita Desai

Thursday, September 15, 2022 from to (Asia/Kolkata)
at TIFR, Mumbai ( AG-66 )
Description
The definition of what counts as a “signal” of new physics at the LHC is extraordinarily complex. Proposing a new search to combat potentially large standard model backgrounds and determining how current search limits translate to parameters of a new signal model are two sides of the same coin. The first step in either of these is to be able to simulate collision events with accurate kinematics using Monte Carlo generators. Using the case of a weakly interacting dark matter (DM) model introduced in the previous talk, I will show how such a model can be implemented using the Monte Carlo code Pythia8 and how detector responses can be reasonably modelled to reinterpret search limits for it. Using the information of where existing searches fail to cover the well-motivated parameter space of the model, I then show what changes need to be made in the future search strategy and show a proof-of-concept calculation for such a search that is expected to be implemented by CMS at Run-3.