Fermionic decays of NMSSM Higgs bosons under LHC 13 TeV constraints

TL;DR

This study explores how recent LHC 13 TeV data constrains fermionic decay modes of NMSSM Higgs bosons, highlighting dominant decay channels and their dependence on model parameters.

Contribution

It provides a detailed analysis of fermionic decay channels of NMSSM Higgs bosons under current LHC constraints, focusing on parameter regions with large $\lambda$ and small $ aneta$.

Findings

Non SM-like Higgs ($a_1$, $h_2$) have ~90% branching ratio into bottom quarks below 400 GeV.

Branching ratio of $h_2/a_1 ightarrow tar{t}$ can reach 100% when these bosons are mostly singlet.

The analysis identifies parameter regions where fermionic decay modes dominate.

Abstract

This paper investigates the impact of the recent LHC constraints on the Higgs sector in the semi-constrained version of the Next-to-Minimal Supersymmetric Standard Model. Our analysis focuses on the parameter space for which the value of the Higgs doublet-singlet coupling, $\lambda$, is large as possible, while the ratio between the vacuum expectation values of the two Higgs doublets, $\tan\beta$, is small as possible. Under the current constraints, we present the possible fermionic decay channels and reduced cross-section into fermions final states for the lightest neutral Higgs bosons in the NMSSM, $(h_{1}$, $h_{2}$, and $a_{1})$. We found that the branching ratios of the non SM-like Higgs ($a_{1}$ and $h_{2}$) into a pair of bottom quarks are near 90\% level when the Higgs mass below 400 GeV. Moreover, the branching ratio of $h_{2}/a_{1}\rightarrow t\bar{t}$ can reach unity for all mass ranges when these bosons are mostly singlet.