Abstract: The lack of evidence for new physics at the Large Hadron Collider so far has prompted the development of model-independent search techniques. In this study, we compare the anomaly scores of a variety of anomaly detection techniques: an isolation forest, a Gaussian mixture model, a static autoencoder, and a beta-variational autoencoder (VAE), where we define the reconstruction loss of the latter as a weighted combination of regression and classification terms. We apply these algorithms to the 4-vectors of simulated LHC data, but also investigate the performance when the non-VAE algorithms are applied to the latent space variables created by the VAE. In addition, we assess the performance when the anomaly scores of these algorithms are combined in various ways. Using supersymmetric benchmark points, we find that the logical AND combination of the anomaly scores yielded from algorithms trained in the latent space of the VAE is the most effective discriminator of all methods tested.

Abstract: In pure-glue QCD, gluon-gluon scattering in the J(PC) = 0(-+) channel is described by a very simple equation, especially if one considers just the leading contribution to the scattering kernel. Of all components in this kernel, only the three-gluon vertex, V-mu nu rho, is poorly constrained by contemporary analyses; hence, calculations of 0(-+) glueball properties serve as a clear window onto the character and form of V-mu nu rho. This is important given that many modern calculations of V-mu nu rho predict the appearance of an infrared suppression in the scalar function which comes to modulate the bare vertex after the nonperturbative resummation of interactions. Such behaviour is a peculiar prediction; but we find that the suppression is essential if one is to achieve agreement with lattice-QCD predictions for the 0(-+) glueball mass. Hence, it is likely that this novel feature of V-mu nu rho is real and has observable implications for the spectrum, decays and interactions of all QCD bound-states.

Abstract: Neutrino experiments lie at the edge of the intensity frontier and therefore can be exploited to search for new light particles weakly coupled to the visible sector. In this work we derive new constraints on axion-like particles (ALPs) using data from the MicroBooNE experiment, from a search for e(+)e(-) pairs pointing in the direction of the NuMI absorber. In particular, we consider the addition of higher-dimensional effective operators coupling the ALP to the electroweak gauge bosons. These would induce K -> pi a from kaon decay at rest in the NuMI absorber, as well as ALP decays into pairs of leptons or photons. We discuss in detail and compare various results obtained for the decay width K -> pi a in previous literature. For the operator involving the Higgs, MicroBooNE already sets competitive bounds (comparable to those of NA62) for ALP masses between 100 and 200 MeV. We also compute the expected sensitivities from the full NuMI dataset recorded at MicroBooNE. Our results show that a search for a -> gamma gamma signal may be able to improve over current constraints from beam-dump experiments on the operator involving the ALP coupling to the W.

Abstract: We propose an A(4) extension of the Standard Model with a Lepton Quarticity symmetry correlating dark matter stability with the Dirac nature of neutrinos. The flavor symmetry predicts (i) a generalized bottom-tau mass relation involving all families, (ii) small neutrino masses are induced a la seesaw, (iii) CP must be significantly violated in neutrino oscillations, (iv) the atmospheric angle theta(23) lies in the second octant, and (v) only the normal neutrino mass ordering is realized.

Abstract: One of the most promising strategies to identify the nature of dark matter consists in the search for new particles at accelerators and with so-called direct detection experiments. Working within the framework of simplified models, and making use of machine learning tools to speed up statistical inference, we address the question of what we can learn about dark matter from a detection at the LHC and a forthcoming direct detection experiment. We show that with a combination of accelerator and direct detection data, it is possible to identify newly discovered particles as dark matter, by reconstructing their relic density assuming they are weakly interacting massive particles (WIMPs) thermally produced in the early Universe, and demonstrating that it is consistent with the measured dark matter abundance. An inconsistency between these two quantities would instead point either towards additional physics in the dark sector, or towards a non-standard cosmology, with a thermal history substantially different from that of the standard cosmological model.