Dark photons from pions produced in ultraperipheral $PbPb$ collisions

TL;DR

This paper proposes searching for dark photons through pion decays in ultraperipheral lead-lead collisions, providing cross section estimates and event rate predictions for current and future colliders to help constrain dark photon properties.

Contribution

It introduces a novel method to detect dark photons via pion decay in ultraperipheral collisions, with detailed cross section calculations and experimental feasibility analysis.

Findings

Predicted event rates for LHC, HL-LHC, HE-LHC, and FCC.

Estimated cross sections considering nuclear effects.

Future experiments could effectively probe dark photon properties.

Abstract

In this letter we propose the search of dark photons in the decay of pions produced by $\gamma \gamma$ interactions in ultraperipheral $PbPb$ collisions. The cross section is estimated considering an accurate treatment for the absorptive corrections and for the nuclear form factor. Predictions for the event rates are presented considering the expected luminosities for the LHC, High -- Luminosity LHC and High -- Energy LHC as well as for the Future Circular Collider. Our results indicate that a future experimental analysis of the pion production in ultraperipheral heavy ion collisions can be useful to probe the dark photon production and constrain its properties.