Track-Based Triggers for Exotic Signatures

TL;DR

This paper evaluates track-based trigger strategies at the High Luminosity LHC for detecting unconventional signals from long-lived particles, providing insights into trigger efficiency and hardware recommendations.

Contribution

It introduces a comprehensive study of track-based triggers for various exotic signatures, offering new insights and recommendations for hardware implementation at the HL-LHC.

Findings

Trigger efficiency depends on transverse momentum and impact parameter thresholds.

Track-based triggers can effectively identify long-lived particle signatures.

Recommendations improve future hardware trigger designs for exotic signals.

Abstract

Several compelling beyond the Standard Model scenarios predict signals that result in unconventional charged particle trajectories. Signatures for which unusual tracks are the most conspicuous feature pose significant challenges for experiments at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), particularly for the trigger. This article presents a study of track-based triggers for a representative set of long-lived and unconventional signatures at the upcoming High Luminosity LHC. Scenarios studied include large multiplicities of low momentum tracks produced in a soft-unclustered-energy-pattern model, displaced leptons and anomalous prompt tracks predicted in a Supersymmetry model with long-lived staus, and displaced hadrons predicted in a Higgs portal scenario with long-lived scalars. Trigger efficiency is measured as a function of the baseline parameters of a track trigger, including transverse momentum and impact parameter. Recommendations for future hardware-based track triggers are presented.