Searching for Light Physics at the LHC

TL;DR

This paper explores how existing LHC experiments can be used to detect light physics phenomena, such as light dark matter and neutrino interactions, through displaced recoil jets, offering a new approach beyond traditional methods.

Contribution

It highlights the potential of current LHC experiments to probe light physics using displaced recoil jets, a novel application not previously exploited.

Findings

LHC experiments can detect ultra-light scalar and axionic dark matter.

Displaced recoil jets are sensitive to high-energy neutrino scattering.

Existing detectors have untapped potential for light physics searches.

Abstract

Over the last years, new physics in terms of a novel weakly-interacting massive particle (WIMP) has come more and more under pressure from experimental null results. While the remaining WIMP parameter space will be probed by next generation dark matter experiments, models of light new physics have become increasingly popular over the last decade. In an effort to explore the parameter space of such light physics, a myriad of custom designed high-precision/low-energy experiments has been proposed. In this note, however, I argue that existing LHC multipurpose experiments like ATALS and CMS have a so far unexploited potential to probe light physics via appearing displaced recoil jets. In the first part, I discuss the sensitivity of this signature to (ultra-)light scalar and axionic dark matter, while in the second part I show its sensitivity to high-energy neutrino scattering.