Towards resolving strongly-interacting dark sectors at colliders

TL;DR

This paper explores how the energy dependence of high-momentum transfer events at colliders can reveal the strong interaction behavior of dark sectors, potentially informing their ultraviolet structure and complementing lattice studies.

Contribution

It introduces a method to detect the scaling behavior of strongly-interacting dark sectors through collider signatures, focusing on missing energy and high-momentum transfer processes.

Findings

Energy dependence can indicate the UV structure of dark sectors

High-momentum transfer signatures can distinguish strongly-interacting dark sectors

Systematic uncertainties are a key challenge for experimental detection

Abstract

Dark sectors with strong interactions have received considerable interest. Assuming the existence of a minimally coupled dark sector which runs to strong interactions in the infrared, we address the question whether the scaling behavior of this dark sector can be observed in missing energy signatures at present and future hadron colliders. We compare these findings to the concrete case of self-interacting dark matter and demonstrate that the energy dependence of high-momentum transfer final states can in principle be used to gain information about the UV structure of hidden sectors at future hadron colliders, subject to large improvements in systematic uncertainties, which could complement proof-of-principle lattice investigations. We also comment on the case of dark Abelian $U(1)$ theories.