Effects of massive photons from the dark sector on the muon content in extensive air showers

TL;DR

This study investigates how hypothetical massive photons from the dark sector could influence muon production in extensive air showers, concluding that their effect is negligible and unobservable with current methods.

Contribution

It introduces a compact approximation for bremsstrahlung of massive photons and assesses their impact on muon content in air showers through simulations.

Findings

Massive dark sector photons produce negligible muons.

Muon production from these particles is many orders below detectable levels.

The effect is effectively unobservable in current experiments.

Abstract

Inspired by recent astrophysical observations of leptonic excesses measured by satellite experiments, we consider the impact of some general models of the dark sector on the muon production in extensive air showers. We present a compact approximative expression for the bremsstrahlung of a massive photon from an electron and use it within Monte Carlo simulations to estimate the amount of weakly interacting photon-like massive particles that could be produced in an extensive air shower. We find that the resulting muon production is by many orders of magnitude below the average muon count in a shower and thus unobservable.