Quark contact interactions at the LHC

TL;DR

This paper introduces a minimal model of quark contact interactions with a symmetry that suppresses flavor-changing effects, analyzing how two operators influence experimental bounds at the LHC.

Contribution

The paper presents a simplified two-operator model for quark contact interactions that accounts for experimental signatures at high energies, improving upon previous single-operator analyses.

Findings

Two-operator model alters bounds on interaction energy scale

Symmetry suppresses flavor-changing processes

Significant modification of experimental limits at 7 TeV

Abstract

Quark contact interactions are an important signal of new physics. We introduce a model in which the presence of a symmetry protects these new interactions from giving large corrections in flavor changing processes at low energies. This minimal model provides the basic set of operators which must be considered to contribute to the high-energy processes. To discuss their experimental signature in jet pairs produced in proton-proton colllisions, we simplify the number of possible operators down to two. We show (for a representative integrated luminosity of 200 pb^-1 at \surd s = 7 TeV) how the presence of two operators significantly modifies the bound on the characteristic energy scale of the contact interactions which is obtained by keeping a single operator.