Vector Higgs-portal dark matter and the invisible Higgs

TL;DR

This paper investigates vector dark matter candidates coupled to the Higgs sector, showing they can be stable, evade constraints, and significantly influence invisible Higgs decays, potentially explaining the lack of Higgs detection at LHC.

Contribution

It introduces a renormalizable Higgs portal to vector dark matter with a natural Z_2 symmetry, providing a novel mechanism for Higgs invisibility and dark matter stability.

Findings

Vector dark matter can satisfy current experimental constraints.

Higgs decay into vector fields can be significantly enhanced.

This mechanism may explain the non-observation of the Higgs at LHC.

Abstract

The Higgs sector of the Standard Model offers a unique probe of the hidden sector. In this work, we explore the possibility of renormalizable Higgs couplings to the hidden sector vector fields which can constitute dark matter (DM). Abelian gauge sectors with minimal field content, necessary to render the gauge fields massive, have a natural Z_2 parity. This symmetry ensures stability of the vector fields making them viable dark matter candidates, while evading the usual electroweak constraints. We illustrate this idea with the Stueckelberg and Higgs mechanisms. Vector DM is consistent with the WMAP, XENON100, and LHC constraints, while it can affect significantly the invisible Higgs decay. Due to the enhanced branching ratio for the Higgs decay into the longitudinal components of the vector field, the vector Higgs portal provides an efficient way to hide the Higgs at the LHC. This could be the reason why the latest combined ATLAS/CMS data did not bring evidence for the existence of the Higgs boson.