Abstract: Several extensions of the Standard Model predict the production of dark matter particles at the LHC. An uncharted signature of dark matter particles produced in association with VV = (WW -/+)-W-+/- or ZZ pairs from a decay of a dark Higgs boson s is searched for using 139 fb(-1) of pp collisions recorded by the ATLAS detector at a center-of-mass energy of 13 TeV. The s -> V(q (q) over bar )V(q (q) over bar) decays are reconstructed with a novel technique aimed at resolving the dense topology from boosted VV pairs using jets in the calorimeter and tracking information. Dark Higgs scenarios with m(s) > 160 GeV are excluded.

Abstract: Several improvements to the ATLAS triggers used to identify jets containing b-hadrons (b-jets) were implemented for data-taking during Run 2 of the Large Hadron Collider from 2016 to 2018. These changes include reconfiguring the b-jet trigger software to improve primary-vertex finding and allow more stable running in conditions with high pile-up, and the implementation of the functionality needed to run sophisticated taggers used by the offline reconstruction in an online environment. These improvements yielded an order of magnitude better light-flavour jet rejection for the same b-jet identification efficiency compared to the performance in Run 1 (2011-2012). The efficiency to identify b-jets in the trigger, and the conditional efficiency for b-jets that satisfy offline b-tagging requirements to pass the trigger are also measured. Correction factors are derived to calibrate the b-tagging efficiency in simulation to match that observed in data. The associated systematic uncertainties are substantially smaller than in previous measurements. In addition, b-jet triggers were operated for the first time during heavy-ion data-taking, using dedicated triggers that were developed to identify semileptonic b-hadron decays by selecting events with geometrically overlapping muons and jets.

Abstract: In this work we consider point-like monopole production via photon-fusion and Drell-Yan processes in the framework of an effective U(1) gauge field theory obtained from conventional models describing the interaction of magnetically-charged fields with ordinary photons, upon electric-magnetic dualisation. We present arguments based on such dualities which support the conjecture of an effective monopole-velocity-dependent magnetic charge. For the cases of 1 monopoles, we also include a magnetic-moment which is treated as a new phenomenological parameter and, together with the velocity-dependent coupling, allows for a perturbative treatment of the cross-section calculation. We discuss unitarity issues within these effective field theories, in particular we point out that in the spin-1 monopole case only the may restore unitarity. However from an effective-field-theory point of view, this lack of unitarity should not be viewed as an impediment for the phenomenological studies and experimental searches of generic spin-1 monopoles, given that the potential appearance of new degrees of freedom in the ultraviolet completion of such models might restore it. The second part of the paper deals with an appropriate implementation of photon-fusion and Drell-Yan processes based on the above theoretical scenarios into MadGraph UFO models, aimed to serve as a useful tool in interpretations of monopole searches at colliders such as LHC, especially for photon fusion, given that it has not been considered by experimental collaborations so far. Moreover, the experimental implications of such perturbatively reliable monopole searches have been laid out.