Abstract: We report on a hybrid in-beam PET and prompt-gamma Compton imaging system aimed at quasi real-time ion-range verification in proton-therapy treatments. Proof-of-concept experiments were carried out at the radiobiology beam line of the CNA cyclotron facility using a set of two synchronous Compton imagers and different target materials. The time structure of the 18 MeV proton beam was shaped with a series of beam-on and beam-off intervals, thereby mimicking a pulsed proton beam on a long time scale. During beam-on intervals, Compton imagingwas performed utilizing the high energy. -rays promptly emitted from the nuclear reactions occurring in the targets. In the course of the beam-off intervals in situ positron-emission tomography was accomplished with the same imagers using the beta+ decay of activated nuclei. The targets used were stacks of different materials covering also various proton ranges and energies. A systematic study on the performance of these two complementary imaging techniques is reported and the experimental results interpreted on the basis ofMonte Carlo calculations. The results demonstrate the possibility to combine both imaging techniques in a concomitant way, where high-efficiency prompt-gamma imaging is complemented with the high spatial accuracy of PET. Empowered by these results we suggest that a pulsed beam with a suitable duty cycle, in conjunction with in situ Compton- and PET-imaging may help to attain complementary information and quasi real-time range monitoring with high accuracy.

Abstract: Additional Higgs bosons appear in many extensions of the Standard Model (SM). While most existing searches for additional Higgs bosons concentrate on final states consisting of SM particles, final states containing beyond the SM (BSM) particles play an important role in many BSM models. In order to facilitate future searches for such final states, we develop a simplified model framework for heavy Higgs boson decays to a massive SM boson as well as one or more invisible particles. Allowing one kind of BSM mediator in each decay chain, we classify the possible decay topologies for each final state, taking into account all different possibilities for the spin of the mediator and the invisible particles. Our comparison of the kinematic distributions for each possible model realization reveals that the distributions corresponding to the different simplified model topologies are only mildly affected by the different spin hypotheses, while there is significant sensitivity for distinguishing between the different decay topologies. As a consequence, we point out that expressing the results of experimental searches in terms of the proposed simplified model topologies will allow one to constrain wide classes of different BSM models. The application of the proposed simplified model framework is explicitly demonstrated for the example of a mono-Higgs search. For each of the simplified models that are proposed in this paper we provide all necessary ingredients for performing Monte-Carlo simulations such that they can readily be applied in experimental analyses.

Abstract: We present the first lattice study of pion-pion scattering with varying number of colors, N-c. We use lattice simulations with four degenerate quark flavors, N-f = 4, and N-c= 3 – 6. We focus on two scattering channels that do not involve vacuum diagrams. These correspond to two irreducible representations of the SU(4) flavor group: the fully symmetric one, SS, and the fully antisymmetric one, AA. The former is a repulsive channel equivalent to the isospin-2 channel of SU(2). By contrast, the latter is attractive and only exists for N-f >= 4. A representative state is (vertical bar D-s(+) pi(+)> – vertical bar D+ K+ >) /root 2. Using Lfischer's formalism, we extract the near-threshold scattering amplitude and we match our results to Chiral Perturbation Theory (ChPT) at large N-c. For this, we compute the analytical U(N-f) ChPT prediction for two-pion scattering, and use the lattice results to constrain the N-c scaling of the relevant low-energy couplings.

Abstract: Collider searches for dark sectors, new particles interacting only feebly with ordinary matter, have largely focused on identifying signatures of new mediators, leaving much of dark sector structures unexplored. In particular, the existence of dark matter bound states (darkonia) remains to be investigated. This possibility could arise in a simple model in which a dark photon (A') is light enough to generate an attractive force between dark fermions. We report herein a search for a J(PC) = 1(--) darkonium state, the Upsilon(D), produced in the reaction e(+) e(-) -> gamma Upsilon(D), Upsilon(D) -> A'A'A', where the dark photons subsequently decay into pairs of leptons or pions, using 514 fb(-1) of data collected with the BABAR detector. No significant signal is observed, and we set bounds on the gamma – A' kinetic mixing as a function of the dark sector coupling constant for 0.001 < m(A)' < 3.16 GeV and 0.05 < m(Upsilon D) < 9.5 GeV.

Abstract: Axionlike particles (ALPs) are predicted in many extensions of the standard model, and their masses can naturally be well below the electroweak scale. In the presence of couplings to electroweak bosons, these particles could be emitted in flavor-changing B meson decays. We report herein a search for an ALP, a, in the reaction B-+/- -> K(+/-)a, a -> gamma gamma using data collected by the BABAR experiment at SLAC. No significant signal is observed, and 90% confidence level upper limits on the ALP coupling to electroweak bosons are derived as a function of ALP mass, improving current constraints by several orders of magnitude in the range 0.175 GeV < m(a) < 4.78 GeV.