LHC phenomenology of unusual top partners in composite Higgs models

TL;DR

This paper explores the unique collider signatures of unusual top partners in composite Higgs models, including color octet and singlet states, with implications for dark matter and potential confusion with supersymmetric gluinos.

Contribution

It introduces a specific composite Higgs model featuring unconventional top partners and analyzes their LHC phenomenology, highlighting potential dark matter candidates and experimental signatures.

Findings

Color octet top partners could mimic gluinos in collider experiments.

Color singlet top partners may serve as dark matter candidates.

Unusual top partners produce distinctive signals at the LHC.

Abstract

Composite Higgs models with a fermionic UV completion can contain additional colored states beside the usual top-partners. We focus here on a model which contains in addition SU(3) color octet top partners as well as color singlet ones. The latter can in principle serve as a dark matter candidate. We consider a particular composite Higgs model which contains SU(3) color octet top partners besides the usually considered triplet representations. Moreover, color singlet top partners are present as well which can in principle serve as dark matter candidates. We investigate the LHC phenomenology of these unusual top partners. Some of these states could at first glance be confused with gluinos predicted in supersymmetric models.