Results and future plans of the MoEDAL experiment

TL;DR

The MoEDAL experiment at the LHC searches for highly ionising and long-lived particles, with recent results and plans for upgraded detectors to explore new physics beyond the Standard Model.

Contribution

This paper reports on MoEDAL's recent findings and outlines the upcoming upgrade with the MAPP detector to enhance its sensitivity to feebly interacting particles.

Findings

Initial results from MoEDAL's Run 2 data

Plans for the MAPP detector upgrade at Run 3

Enhanced sensitivity to long-lived and feebly interacting particles

Abstract

The unprecedented collision energy of the LHC has opened up a new discovery frontier. Unfortunately, signs of new physics have yet to be seen. The LHC's first dedicated search experiment, MoEDAL, started data taking for LHC Run 2. MoEDAL is designed to search highly ionising particle avatars of new physics using pp and heavy-ion collisions at the LHC. The planned upgrade for MoEDAL at Run 3 - the MAPP detector (MoEDAL Apparatus for Penetrating Particles) - will extend MoEDAL's physics reach to include feebly interacting and long-lived messengers of physics beyond the Standard Model. This will allow us to explore a number of models of new physics, including dark-sector models, in a complementary way to that of conventional LHC collider detectors. This article focuses on recent results and plans for the LHC Run 3.