Abstract: Measurements of electrons from ?e interactions are crucial for the Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE) neutrino oscillation program, as well as searches for physics beyond the standard model, supernova neutrino detection, and solar neutrino measurements. This article describes the selection and reconstruction of low-energy (Michel) electrons in the ProtoDUNE-SP detector. ProtoDUNE-SP is one of the prototypes for the DUNE far detector, built and operated at CERN as a charged particle test beam experiment. A sample of low-energy electrons produced by the decay of cosmic muons is selected with a purity of 95%. This sample is used to calibrate the low-energy electron energy scale with two techniques. An electron energy calibration based on a cosmic ray muon sample uses calibration constants derived from measured and simulated cosmic ray muon events. Another calibration technique makes use of the theoretically well-understood Michel electron energy spectrum to convert reconstructed charge to electron energy. In addition, the effects of detector response to low-energy electron energy scale and its resolution including readout electronics threshold effects are quantified. Finally, the relation between the theoretical and reconstructed low-energy electron energy spectra is derived, and the energy resolution is characterized. The low-energy electron selection presented here accounts for about 75% of the total electron deposited energy. After the addition of lost energy using a Monte Carlo simulation, the energy resolution improves from about 40% to 25% at 50 MeV. These results are used to validate the expected capabilities of the DUNE far detector to reconstruct low-energy electrons.

Abstract: We present a variational quantum eigensolver (VQE) algorithm for the efficient bootstrapping of the causal representation of multiloop Feynman diagrams in the loop-tree duality or, equivalently, the selection of acyclic configurations in directed graphs. A loop Hamiltonian based on the adjacency matrix describing a multiloop topology, and whose different energy levels correspond to the number of cycles, is minimized by VQE to identify the causal or acyclic configurations. The algorithm has been adapted to select multiple degenerated minima and thus achieves higher detection rates. A performance comparison with a Grover's based algorithm is discussed in detail. The VQE approach requires, in general, fewer qubits and shorter circuits for its implementation, albeit with lesser success rates.

Abstract: A search is presented for displaced production of Higgs bosons or Z bosons, originating from the decay of a neutral long-lived particle (LLP) and reconstructed in the decay modes H -& gamma;& gamma; and Z -ee. The analysis uses the full Run 2 dataset of proton-proton collisions delivered by the LHC at an energy of p1/4 13 TeV between 2015 and 2018 and recorded by the ATLAS detector, corresponding to an ffiffi s integrated luminosity of 139 fb-1. Exploiting the capabilities of the ATLAS liquid argon calorimeter to precisely measure the arrival times and trajectories of electromagnetic objects, the analysis searches for the signature of pairs of photons or electrons which arise from a common displaced vertex and which arrive after some delay at the calorimeter. The results are interpreted in a gauge-mediated supersymmetry breaking model with pair-produced Higgsinos that decay to LLPs, and each LLP subsequently decays into either a Higgs boson or a Z boson. The final state includes at least two particles that escape direct detection, giving rise to missing transverse momentum. No significant excess is observed above the background expectation. The results are used to set upper limits on the cross section for Higgsino pair production, up to a & chi;& SIM;01 mass of 369 (704) GeV for decays with 100% branching ratio of & chi; & SIM;01 to Higgs (Z) bosons for a & chi;& SIM;01 lifetime of 2 ns. A model-independent limit is also set on the production of pairs of photons or electrons with a significant delay in arrival at the calorimeter.

Abstract: The mass spectrum of pi(+) and rho(+) mesons in the presence of a static uniform magnetic field (B) over right arrow is studied within a two-flavor Nambu-Jona-Lasinio-like model. We improve previous calculations, taking into account the effect of Schwinger phases carried by quark propagators and using an expansion of meson fields in terms of the solutions of the corresponding equations of motion for nonzero B. It is shown that the meson polarization functions are diagonal in this basis. Our numerical results for the rho(+) meson spectrum are found to disfavor the existence of a meson condensate induced by the magnetic field. In the case of the pi(+) meson, pi-rho mixing effects are analyzed for the meson lowest-energy state. The predictions of the model are compared with available lattice QCD results.

Abstract: We study the phenomenology of a particular leptoquark extension of the Standard Model (SM), namely the doublet-singlet scalar leptoquark extension of the SM (DSL-SM). Besides generating Majorana mass for neutrinos, these leptoquarks contribute to muon and electron (g – 2) and various lepton flavor violating processes. Collider signatures of the benchmark points (BPs), consistent with the neutrino oscillation data, anomalous muon/electron magnetic moments, experimental bounds on the charged lepton flavor violation observables, etc., are studied at the LHC/FCC with center-of-mass energies of 14, 27 and 100 TeV. While the two -1=3 charged colored scalars from the singlet and the doublet leptoquark mix with each other, the charge 2=3 colored scalar from the doublet leptoquark remains pure. With a near-degenerate mass spectrum, the pure and mixed leptoquark states are shown to be distinguishable from multiple final states, while discerning between the two mixed states remains very challenging.