Heavy Neutral Leptons without Prejudice

TL;DR

This paper investigates the potential to detect Heavy Neutral Leptons (HNLs) at future colliders like HL-LHC and FCC-ee, emphasizing model-independent approaches, displaced decay searches, and the importance of Higgs measurements.

Contribution

It introduces a model-independent collider analysis of HNLs, decoupling mixing angles from Yukawa couplings, and compares sensitivities across different collider setups.

Findings

FCC-ee and HL-LHC sensitivities to Yukawa coupling are comparable at zero mixing.

Displaced decay searches significantly enhance detection prospects.

Precision Higgs measurements impose strong constraints on HNL parameters.

Abstract

Heavy Neutral Leptons (HNLs) provide a compelling extension to the Standard Model, addressing the neutrino masses, baryogenesis, and dark matter problems. We perform a model-independent collider study, decoupling the active-sterile mixing angle ($V$) from the Yukawa coupling ($y$), and explore sensitivities at the HL-LHC for prompt and displaced decays. We also consider the possibility of HNLs being long-lived particles decaying in far detectors as FASER. In addition, we study the expected reach at FCC-ee for the prompt and displaced cases. For zero mixing, FCC-ee and HL-LHC sensitivities to $y$ are comparable, with Higgs width measurements imposing the strongest constraints. With non-zero mixing, sensitivities are dominated by $V$, significantly constraining parameter space. This work highlights the importance of precision Higgs studies and displaced searches in probing HNLs at current and future colliders.