Impact of the SUSY Decays on the Search for the MSSM Higgs bosons at the LHC

TL;DR

This paper examines how supersymmetric decay modes of neutral Higgs bosons can dominate and suppress traditional detection channels at the LHC, emphasizing their importance in Higgs searches within the MSSM framework.

Contribution

It highlights the significant impact of SUSY decay channels on Higgs detection strategies at the LHC, which has been underappreciated in previous analyses.

Findings

SUSY decays can dominate when kinematically accessible.

Traditional Higgs detection channels may be suppressed.

SUSY decay modes are crucial for accurate Higgs searches.

Abstract

In the context of the Minimal Supersymmetric extension of the Standard Model, we discuss the impact of the decays of the neutral Higgs bosons into supersymmetric particles, charginos/neutralinos and sfermions. We show that these decay modes could be dominant, when they are kinematically accessible, thus strongly suppressing the branching ratios for the decay channels which are used to detect the Higgs bosons at hadron colliders. These SUSY decay modes should therefore not be overlooked in the search for the Higgs particles at the LHC.