We examine the theoretical motivations for long-lived particle (LLP) signals at the LHC in a comprehensive survey of standard model (SM) extensions. LLPs are a common prediction of a wide range of theories that address unsolved fundamental mysteries such as naturalness, dark matter, baryogenesis and neutrino masses, and represent a natural and generic possibility for physics beyond the SM (BSM). In most cases the LLP lifetime can be treated as a free parameter from the µm scale up to the Big Bang Nucleosynthesis limit of ∼10 7 m. Neutral LLPs with lifetimes above ∼ 100 m are particularly difficult to probe, as the sensitivity of the LHC main detectors is limited by challenging backgrounds, triggers, and small acceptances. MATHUSLA is a proposal for a minimally instrumented, large-volume surface detector near ATLAS or CMS. It would search for neutral LLPs produced in HL-LHC collisions by reconstructing displaced vertices (DVs) in a low-background environment, extending the sensitivity of the main detectors by orders of magnitude in the long-lifetime regime. We study the LLP physics opportunities afforded by a MATHUSLA-like detector at the HL-LHC, assuming backgrounds can be rejected as expected. We develop a model-independent approach to describe the sensitivity of MATHUSLA to BSM LLP signals, and compare it to DV and missing energy searches at ATLAS or CMS. We then explore the BSM motivations for LLPs in considerable detail, presenting a large number of new sensitivity studies. While our discussion is especially oriented towards the long-lifetime regime at MATHUSLA, this survey underlines the importance of a varied LLP search program at the LHC in general. By synthesizing these results into a general discussion of the top-down and bottom-up motivations for LLP searches, it is our aim to demonstrate the exceptional strength and breadth of the physics case for the construction of the MATHUSLA detector.

The observed neutrino oscillation data might be explained by new physics at a TeV scale, which is testable in the future experiments. Among various possibilities, the low-energy Higgs triplet model is a prime candidate of such new physics since it predicts clean signatures of lepton flavor violating processes directly related to the neutrino masses and mixing. It is discussed how various neutrino mass patterns can be discriminated by examining the lepton flavor violating decays of charged leptons as well as the collider signatures of a doubly charged Higgs boson in the model.

Abstract:We update the constraints on two-Higgs-doublet models (2HDMs) focusing on the parameter space relevant to explain the present muon g − 2 anomaly, ∆a µ , in four different types of models, type I, II, "lepton specific" (or X) and "flipped" (or Y). We show that the strong constraints provided by the electroweak precision data on the mass of the pseudoscalar Higgs, whose contribution may account for ∆a µ , are evaded in regions where the charged scalar is degenerate with the heavy neutral one and the mixing angles α and β satisfy the Standard Model limit β − α ≈ π/2. We combine theoretical constraints from vacuum stability and perturbativity with direct and indirect bounds arising from collider and B physics. Possible future constraints from the electron g − 2 are also considered. If the 126 GeV resonance discovered at the LHC is interpreted as the light CP-even Higgs boson of the 2HDM, we find that only models of type X can satisfy all the considered theoretical and experimental constraints.

We analyze the mass of the axino, the fermionic superpartner of the axion, in general supergravity models incorporating a Peccei-Quinn-symmetry and determine the cosmological constraints on this mass. In particular, we derive a simple criterion to identify models with an LSP-axino which has a mass of O(m 2 3/2 /f P Q ) = O(keV) and can serve as a candidate for (warm) dark matter. We point out that such models have very special properties and in addition, the small axino mass has to be protected against radiative corrections by demanding small couplings in the Peccei-Quinn-sector. Generically, we find an axino mass of order m 3/2 . Such masses are constrained by the requirement of an axino decay which occurs before the decoupling of the ordinary LSP. Especially, for a large Peccei-Quinn-scale f P Q > 10 11 GeV this constraint might be difficult to fulfill.

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