Search for Dark Photons Produced in 13 TeV pp Collisions

Phys Rev Lett. 2018 Feb 9;120(6):061801. doi: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.120.061801.

Abstract

Searches are performed for both promptlike and long-lived dark photons, A^{'}, produced in proton-proton collisions at a center-of-mass energy of 13 TeV, using A^{'}→μ^{+}μ^{-} decays and a data sample corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 1.6 fb^{-1} collected with the LHCb detector. The promptlike A^{'} search covers the mass range from near the dimuon threshold up to 70 GeV, while the long-lived A^{'} search is restricted to the low-mass region 214<m(A^{'})<350 MeV. No evidence for a signal is found, and 90% confidence level exclusion limits are placed on the γ-A^{'} kinetic-mixing strength. The constraints placed on promptlike dark photons are the most stringent to date for the mass range 10.6<m(A^{'})<70 GeV, and are comparable to the best existing limits for m(A^{'})<0.5 GeV. The search for long-lived dark photons is the first to achieve sensitivity using a displaced-vertex signature.