We propose a new explanation for excess events observed in the search for a high-mass resonance decaying into dibosons by the ATLAS experiment. The resonance is identified as a composite spin-$0$ particle that couples to the Standard Model gauge bosons via dimension-5 operators. The excess events can be explained if the dimension-5 operators are suppressed by a mass scale of ${\cal O}(1$-$10$) TeV. We also construct a model of hidden strong gauge dynamics which realizes the spin-$0$ particle as its lightest composite state, with appropriate couplings to Standard Model gauge bosons.
We expand the previous analyses of the conformal barrier on the walking technirho for the 2 TeV diboson excesses reported by the ATLAS collaboration, with a special emphasis on the hidden local symmetry (HLS) constraints. We first show that the Standard Model (SM) Higgs Lagrangian is equivalent to the scale-invariant nonlinear chiral Lagrangian, which is further gauge equivalent to the scale-invariant HLS model, with the scale symmetry realized nonlinearly via SM Higgs as a (pseudo-) dilaton. The scale symmetry forbids the new vector boson decay to the 125 GeV Higgs plus W/Z boson, in sharp co…
We investigate the prospects for producing new, light, hidden states at a future $e^+ e^-$ collider in a Higgsed dark $U(1)_D$ model, which we call the Double Dark Portal model. The simultaneous presence of both vector and scalar portal couplings immediately modifies the Standard Model Higgsstrahlung channel, $e^+ e^- \to Zh$, at leading order in each coupling. In addition, each portal leads to complementary signals which can be probed at direct and indirect detection dark matter experiments. After accounting for current constraints from LEP and LHC, we demonstrate that a future $e^+ e^-$ Higg…
We discuss the sensitivity of neutrino experiments at the luminosity frontier to generic hidden sectors containing new (sub)-GeV neutral states. The weak interaction of these states with the Standard Model can be efficiently probed through all of the allowed renormalizable `portals' (in the Higgs, vector, and neutrino sectors) at fixed target proton beam facilities, with complementary sensitivity to colliders. We concentrate on the kinetic-mixing vector portal, and show that certain regions of the parameter space for a new secluded U(1) gauge sector with long-lived sub-GeV mass states decaying…
We show that in the model of hidden sector of the Universe, interacting with the Standard-Model sector through the photonic portal, the Standard-Model Coulomb potential gets a tiny hidden-sector additive correction that might turn out to be either exciting or fatal for the verification of this model.
A new weak-isospin triplet of scalar bosons is introduced to the Standard Model in order to ensure the electroweak symmetry for a conjectured new weak coupling between a hidden sector of the Universe, responsible for cold dark matter, and the Standard-Model sector (involving now the new triplet). The considered coupling may be called "electroweak portal" to the structure of hidden sector. After spontaneously breaking the electroweak symmetry by the Standard-Model Higgs mechanism, it includes the so called "photonic portal" introduced by us previously.
We study the recent $e^\pm$ cosmic ray excess reported by DAMPE in a Hidden Valley Model with lepton-portal dark matter. We find the electron-portal can account for the excess well and satisfy the DM relic density and direct detection bounds, while electron+muon/electron+muon+tau-portal suffers from strong constraints from lepton flavor violating observables, such as $μ\to 3 e$. We also discuss possible collider signatures of our model, both at the LHC and a future 100 TeV hadron collider.
Confining hidden sectors are an attractive possibility for physics beyond the Standard Model (SM). They are especially motivated by neutral naturalness theories, which reconcile the lightness of the Higgs with the strong constraints on colored top partners. We study hidden QCD with one light quark flavor, coupled to the SM via effective operators suppressed by the mass $M$ of new electroweak-charged particles. This effective field theory is inspired by a new tripled top model of supersymmetric neutral naturalness. The hidden sector is accessed primarily via the $Z$ and Higgs portals, which als…
A weak photon interaction with the hidden sector of the Universe, introduced recently to realize a "photonic portal", (to such a hypothetic sector responsible for cold dark matter), is conjectured to be embedded in a more extended weak interaction displaying electroweak symmetry spontaneously broken by the Standard-Model Higgs mechanism. This is a hypothetic new weak interaction between hidden and Standard-Model sectors of the Universe, appearing in our model in addition to the conventional electroweak interaction acting in the Standard-Model sector.
We develop a phenomenological formalism for mixing effects between the Standard Model and hidden-sector fields, motivated by dark matter in the Universe as well as string theories. The scheme includes multiple Higgs-portal interactions in the scalar sector as well as multiple gauge-kinetic mixings in the abelian gauge sector. While some of the mixing effects can be cast in closed form, other elements can be controlled analytically only by means of perturbative expansions in the ratio of standard scales over large hidden scales. Higgs and vector-boson masses and mixings are illustrated numerica…
We investigate the prospects for detecting a hidden sector at an $e^+ e^-$ collider. The hidden sector is assumed to be composed of invisible particles that carry no charges under the Standard Model gauge interactions, and whose primary interactions with ordinary matter are through the Higgs portal. We consider both the cases when the decays of an on-shell Higgs into a pair of hidden sector particles are kinematically allowed, and the case when such decays are kinematically forbidden. We find that at collider energies below a TeV, the most sensitive channel involves production of an on-shell o…
We study baryogenesis via a gaugino portal, the supersymmetric counterpart to the widely studied kinetic mixing portal, to a hidden sector. CP and baryon number violating decays of a hidden sector gaugino into the visible sector can produce the observed baryon asymmetry of the Universe. The tiny portal coupling is crucial in producing late out-of-equilibrium decays, after washout processes that can erase the asymmetry have gone out of equilibrium. We study this mechanism within various scenarios, including freeze-in or freeze-out of the hidden gaugino, as well as extended frameworks where the …
In the discussed model, the cold dark matter consists of Dirac spin-1/2 fermions, sterile from all Standard Model charges, where masses are generated by a nonzero vacuum expectation value of a field of scalar bosons, also assumed to be sterile. For convenience, these sterile particles have beeen called sterinos and sterons, respectively. It has been conjectured that our sterile world of sterinos and sterons can communicate with the familiar Standard Model world not only through gravity, but also through a photonic portal provided by a very weak effective interaction involving the electromagnet…
The Higgs field mass term, being superrenomalizable, has a unique status within the standard model. Through the opening it affords, $SU(3) \times SU(2) \times U(1)$ singlet fields can have renormalizable couplings to standard model fields. We present examples that are neither grotesque nor unnatural. A possible consequence is to spread the Higgs particle resonance into several weaker ones, or to afford it additional, effectively invisible decay channels.
Interpretations of searches for the Higgs boson are governed by model-dependent combinations of Higgs production cross sections and Higgs branching ratios. Mixing of the Higgs doublet with a hidden sector captures modifications from the Standard Model Higgs phenomenology in the standard search channels in a representative way, in particular because invisible Higgs decay modes open up. As a consequence, LHC exclusion bounds, which disfavor a heavy Standard Model Higgs can be consistently understood in terms of a standard-hidden mixed Higgs system. Shedding light on the possible existence of suc…
We describe more precisely the mechanism of spontaneous mass generation in the previously proposed model of hidden sector of the Universe. The hidden sector is conjectured to consist of sterile spin-1/2 fermions (sterinos) whose mass is spontaneously generated by sterile scalar bosons (sterons), while their interactions are mediated by sterile antisymmetric-tensor bosons (A bosons). Such a sector communicates with the familiar Standard Model sector through a photonic portal acting weakly between both sectors (but stronger than the universal gravity). This is due to photons which, beside sterin…
We present a framework for the construction of portal effective theories (PETs) that couple effective field theories of the Standard Model (SM) to light hidden messenger fields. Using this framework we construct electroweak and strong scale PETs that couple the SM to messengers carrying spin zero, one half, or one. The electroweak scale PETs encompass all portal operators up to dimension five, while the strong scale PETs additionally contain all portal operators of dimension six and seven that contribute at leading order to quark-flavour violating transitions. Using the strong scale PETs, we d…
We examine current constraints on and the future sensitivity to the strength of couplings between quarks and neutrinos in the presence of a form factor generated from loop effects of hidden sector particles that interact with quarks via new interactions. We consider models associated with either vector or scalar interactions of quarks and leptons generated by hidden sector dynamics. We study constraints on these models using data from coherent elastic neutrino-nucleus scattering and solar neutrino experiments and demonstrate how these new interactions may be discovered by utilizing the recoil …
We study the Higgs portal from the Standard-Model to a hidden sector and examine which elements of the extended theory can be discovered and explored at the LHC. Our model includes two Higgs bosons covering parameter regions where the LHC will be sensitive to two, one or none of the particles at typical discovery luminosities for Standard Model Higgs production.
We classify the complete set of dimension-5 operators relevant for the resonant production of a singlet of spin 0 or 2 linearly coupled to the Standard Model (SM). We compute the decay width of such states as a function of the effective couplings, and provide the matching to various well-motivated New Physics scenarios. We then investigate the possibility that one of these neutral resonances be at the origin of the excess in diboson production recently reported by the ATLAS collaboration. We perform a shape analysis of the excess under full consideration of the systematic uncertainties to extr…
We consider the possibility that the Higgs boson can act as a link to a hidden sector in the context of pure-glue hidden valley models. In these models the standard model is weakly coupled, through loops of heavy messengers fields, to a hidden sector whose low energy dynamics is described by a pure-Yang-Mills theory. Such a hidden sector contains several metastable hidden glueballs. In this work we shall extend earlier results on hidden valleys to include couplings of the messengers to the standard model Higgs sector. The effective interactions at one-loop couple the hidden gluons to the stand…
Ultraviolet physics typically induces a kinetic mixing between gauge singlets which is marginal and hence non-decoupling in the infrared. In singlet extensions of the minimal supersymmetric standard model, e.g. the next-to-minimal supersymmetric standard model, this furnishes a well motivated and distinctive portal connecting the visible sector to any hidden sector which contains a singlet chiral superfield. In the presence of singlet kinetic mixing, the hidden sector automatically acquires a light mass scale in the range 0.1 - 100 GeV induced by electroweak symmetry breaking. In theories with…
Superradiant instability turns rotating astrophysical black holes into unique probes of light axions. We consider what happens when a light axion is coupled to a strongly coupled hidden gauge sector. In this case superradiance results in an adiabatic increase of a hidden sector CP-violating $θ$-parameter in a near horizon region. This may trigger a first order phase transition in the gauge sector. As a result a significant fraction of a black hole mass is released as a cloud of hidden mesons and can be later converted into electromagnetic radiation. This results in a violent electromagnetic bu…
Relation between the lepton and quark mixings: $U_{PMNS} \approx V_{CKM}^{\dagger} U_X$, where $U_X$ is the BM or TBM mixing matrices, implies the quark-lepton (Grand) unification and existence of hidden sector with certain flavor symmetries. The latter couples to the visible sector via the neutrino portal and is responsible for $U_X$, as well as for smallness of neutrino mass. GUT ensures appearance of $\sim V_{CKM}$ in the lepton mixing. General features of this scenario (inverse or double seesaw, screening of the Dirac structures, basis fixing symmetry) are described and two realizations ar…
We study a model of dark matter in which the hidden sector interacts with standard model particles via a hidden photonic portal. We investigate the effects of this new interaction on the hydrogen atom, including the Stark, Zeeman and hyperfine effects. Using the accuracy of the measurement of energy, we obtain an upper bound for the coupling constant of the model. We also calculate the contribution from the hidden photonic portal to the anomalous magnetic moment of the muon, which provides an important probe of physics beyond the standard model.
The experiment of Krasznahorkay \textit{et al} observed the transition of a $\rm{^{8}Be}$ excited state to its ground state and accompanied by an emission of $e^{+}e^{-}$ pair with 17 MeV invariant mass. This 6.8$σ$ anomaly can be fitted by a new light gauge boson. We consider the new particle as a $U(1)$ gauge boson, $Z'$, which plays as a portal linking dark sector and visible sector. In particular, we study the new $U(1)$ gauge symmetry as a hidden or non-hidden group separately. The generic hidden $U(1)$ model, referred to as dark $Z$ model, is excluded by imposing various experimental con…
We show that the 't Hooft-Polyakov monopole model in the hidden sector with Higgs portal interaction makes a viable dark matter model, where monopole and massive vector dark matter (VDM) are stable due to topological conservation and the unbroken subgroup $U(1)_X$. We show that, even though observed CMB data requires the dark gauge coupling to be quite small, a right amount of VDM thermal relic can be obtained via $s$-channel resonant annihilation for the mass of VDM close to or smaller than the half of SM higgs mass, thanks to Higgs portal interaction. Monopole relic density turns out to be s…
We have built a lepton-specific next-to-minimal two-Higgs-doublet-portal vector dark matter model. The vector dark matter in the hidden sector does not directly couple to the visible sector, but instead annihilates into the hidden Higgs bosons which decay through a small coupling into the CP-odd Higgs bosons. In this model, the Galactic center gamma-ray excess is mainly due to the 2-step cascade annihilation with $τ$'s in the final state. The obtained mass of the CP-odd Higgs $A$ in the Galactic center excess fit can explain the muon $g-2$ anomaly at the 2$σ$ level without violating the string…
The Higgs sector of the Standard Model offers a unique opportunity to probe the hidden sector. The Higgs squared operator is the only dimension two operator which is Lorentz and gauge invariant. It can therefore couple both to scalar curvature and the hidden sector at the dim--4 level. We consider the possibility that a combination of the Higgs and a singlet from the hidden sector plays the role of inflaton, due to their large couplings to gravity. This implies that the quartic couplings satisfy certain constraints which leads to distinct low energy phenomenology, including Higgs signals at th…
We construct explicit string theory models realizing the recently proposed "Stückelberg Portal" scenario, a framework for building Z' mediation models without the need to introduce unwanted exotic matter charged under the Standard Model. This scenario can be viewed purely field-theoretically, although it is particularly well motivated from string theory. By analyzing carefully the Stückelberg couplings between the Abelian gauge bosons and the RR axions, we construct the first global intersecting brane models which extend the Standard Model with a genuine hidden sector, to which it is nonethele…
We analyze the neutrino phenomenology in an $SU(5)$ F-theory model with both a visible sector and a twin hidden sector. At low energies, the strong and weak scales of the two sectors may differ but the spectrum of states is described by the MSSM (MSSM$^\prime$) in the visible (twin) sectors. What is special about the model is that there are right-handed neutrinos which couple to both sectors via Yukawa couplings. As a result, assuming 3 right-handed neutrinos with a large mass much greater than the weak scale, at tree-level the seesaw mechanism results in 3 massive Majorana neutrinos and 3 mas…
We discuss new physics phenomenology of hidden scalar ($S$), pseudoscalar ($P$), vector ($V$) and axial-vector ($A$) particles coupled to nucleons and leptons, which could give contributions to proton charge radius, $(g-2)_μ$, $^8$Be-$^4$He anomaly and electric dipole moment (EDM) of Standard Model (SM) particles. In particular, we estimate sensitivity of NA64$μ$ experiment to observe muon missing energy events involving hidden scalar and vector particles. That analysis is based on {\tt GEANT4} Monte Carlo simulation of the signal process of muon scattering off target nuclei $μN \to μN S(V)$ f…
We present a hidden Abelian extension of the Standard Model including a complex scalar as a dark matter candidate and a light scalar acting as a long range force carrier between dark matter particles. The Sommerfeld enhanced annihilation cross-section of the dark matter explains the observed cosmic ray excesses. The light scalar field also gives rise to potentially large cross-sections of dark matter on nucleon, therefore providing an interesting way to probe this model simultaneously at direct and indirect dark matter search experiments. We constrain the parameter-space of the model by taking…
In this thesis, we start by reviewing all constraints applying on self-interacting DM with a light mediator considering well-known Higgs portal and Kinetic Mixing portal models as concrete examples. Then, we elaborate on the Sommerfeld effect, and we study its many implications on self-interacting DM models with light mediator. Next, we investigate how to account for the DM relic abundance in such portal models which present a generic structure with three populations (Standard Model, DM and mediator particles) connected to each other through three interactions resulting from two coupling stren…
Many models of Higgs portal Dark Matter (DM) find themselves under pressure from increasingly tight direct detection constraints. In the framework of gauge field DM, we study how such bounds can be relaxed while retaining the thermal WIMP paradigm. When the hidden sector gauge symmetry is broken via the Higgs mechanism, the hidden sector generally contains unstable states which are lighter than dark matter. These states provide DM with an efficient annihilation channel. As a result, the DM relic abundance and the direct detection limits are controlled by different parameters, and the two can e…
Hidden monopole is a plausible dark matter candidate due to its stability, but its direct experimental search is extremely difficult due to feeble interactions with the standard model particles in the minimal form. Then, we introduce an axion, $a$, connecting the hidden monopole and the standard model particles and examine the current limits and future prospects of direct dark matter searches and beam-dump experiments. We find two parameter regions around $m_a = {\cal O}(10)$ MeV, $f_a = {\cal O}(10^{5})$ GeV and $m_a = {\cal O}(100)$ MeV, $f_a = {\cal O}(10^{4})$ GeV where monopole dark matte…
If the hidden sector contains more than one U(1) groups, additional dim-4 couplings (beyond the kinetic mixing) between the massive U(1) fields and the hypercharge generally appear. These are of the form similar to the Chern-Simons interactions. We study the phenomenology of such couplings including constraints from laboratory experiments and implications for dark matter. The hidden vector fields can play the role of dark matter whose characteristic signature would be monochromatic gamma ray emission from the galactic center. We show that this possibility is consistent with the LHC and other l…
We revisit the Higgs portal vector dark matter model including a hidden sector Higgs field that generates the mass of the vector dark matter. The model becomes renormalizable and has two scalar bosons, the mixtures of the standard model (SM) Higgs and the hidden sector Higgs bosons. The strong bound from direct detection such as XENON100 is evaded due to the cancellation mechanism between the contributions from two scalar bosons. As a result, the model becomes still viable in large range of dark matter mass, contrary to some claims in the literature. The Higgs properties are also affected, the…
The existence of hidden sectors weakly coupled to the visible one has been extensively studied as a way to extend the Standard Model (SM) and to provide a good dark matter candidate. In this work we analyze two models in which gauge and scalar hidden fields interact with the visible sector which, for simplicity we take as an Abelian Higgs model. In one of them, the hidden sector consists of an uncharged scalar. The connection with the visible Abelian Higgs sector is in this case provided by the interaction between the scalars in the two sectors and also by the coupling between the hidden scala…
The understanding of the origin of dark matter has great importance for cosmology and particle physics. Several interesting extensions of the standard model dealing with solution of this problem motivate the concept of hidden sectors consisting of SU(3)xSU(2)_LxU(1)_Y singlet fields. Among these models, the mirror matter model is certainly one of the most interesting. The model explains the origin of parity violation in weak interactions, it could also explain the baryon asymmetry of the Universe and provide a natural ground for the explanation of dark matter. The mirror matter could have a po…
The dark photon and the axion (or axion-like particle) are popular light particles of the hidden sector. Each of them has been actively searched for through the couplings called the vector portal and the axion portal. We introduce a new portal connecting the dark photon and the axion (axion--photon--dark photon, axion--dark photon--dark photon), which emerges in the presence of the two particles. This dark axion portal is genuinely new couplings, not just from a product of the vector portal and the axion portal, because of the internal structure of these couplings. We present a simple model th…
We consider the possibility that along the thermal history of the Universe, dark matter (DM) would have been created from Standard Model particles, either through a kinetic mixing portal to an extra U(1) gauge field, or through the Higgs portal. Depending solely on the DM particle mass, on the portal and on the DM hidden sector interaction, we show how the observed DM relic density can be obtained. There are four possible freeze-in/reannihilation/freeze-out regimes, which together result in a simple characteristic relic density phase diagram, with the shape of a "Mesa". In the case of the kine…
We continue the discussion of a proposed model of hidden sector of the Universe, consisting of sterile spin-1/2 Dirac fermions ("sterinos"), sterile spin-0 bosons ("sterons") with spontaneously nonzero vacuum expectation value, and sterile nongauge mediating bosons ("A bosons") described by an antisymmetric-tensor field (of dimension one). The Standard-Model electromagnetic field (of dimension two) multiplied by the steron vacuum expectation value becomes in a spontaneous way a source of A-boson field mediating new weak interactions in hidden sector and providing - due to the action of electro…
We introduce a dark neutrino sector which respects a hidden $U(1)^\prime$ gauge symmetry, subsequently broken by the vacuum expectation value of a dark scalar. The model is a self-consistent realisation of an extended hidden sector that communicates with the SM only via the three renormalizable portals, namely neutrino, vector and scalar mixing. The interplay between portal couplings leads to several novel signatures in heavy neutrino, dark photon, and dark scalar searches, typically characterised by multi-leptons plus missing energy and displaced vertices. A striking signature arises in kaon …
Visible-sector SUSY-breaking effects are computed in terms of hidden-sector correlation functions for generic holomorphic scalar portals. The solutions, which are valid irrespective of the hidden-sector dynamics, are approximated with the help of the operator product expansion (OPE). Indeed, for theories with superconformal symmetry at high energy, the superconformal OPE formalism can be used to disentangle the high-energy dynamics, encoded in the OPE coefficients, from the low-energy dynamics of the SUSY-breaking vacuum expectation values. A systematic method is proposed to compute the OPE co…
Annihilating dark matter (DM) models based on a scalar hidden sector with Higgs portal-like couplings to the Standard Model are considered as a possible explanation for recently observed cosmic ray excesses. Two versions of the model are studied, one with non-thermal DM as the origin of the boost factor and one with Sommerfeld enhancement. In the case of non-thermal DM, four hidden sector scalars which transform under a U(1)_{X} symmetry are added. The heaviest scalars decouple and later decay to DM scalars, so providing the boost factor necessary to explain the present DM annihilation rate. T…
The Higgs sector of the Standard Model offers a unique probe of the hidden sector. In this work, we explore the possibility of renormalizable Higgs couplings to the hidden sector vector fields which can constitute dark matter (DM). Abelian gauge sectors with minimal field content, necessary to render the gauge fields massive, have a natural Z_2 parity. This symmetry ensures stability of the vector fields making them viable dark matter candidates, while evading the usual electroweak constraints. We illustrate this idea with the Stueckelberg and Higgs mechanisms. Vector DM is consistent with the…
We consider a broad class of supersymmetric theories in which dark matter (DM) is the lightest superpartner (LSP) of a hidden sector that couples very weakly to visible sector fields. Portal interactions connecting visible and hidden sectors mediate the decay of the lightest observable superpartner (LOSP) into the LSP, allowing the LHC to function as a spectacular probe of the origin of hidden sector DM. As shown in a companion paper, this general two-sector framework allows only for a handful of DM production mechanisms, each of which maps to a distinctive window in lifetimes and cross-sectio…
We study the freeze-in production of Feebly Interacting Massive Particle (FIMP) dark matter candidates through a neutrino portal. We consider a hidden sector comprised of a fermion and a complex scalar, with the lightest one regarded as a FIMP candidate. We implement the Type-I Seesaw mechanism for generating the masses of the Standard Model (SM) neutrinos and consider three heavy neutrinos, responsible for mediating the interactions between the hidden and the SM sectors. We assume that an early matter-dominated era (EMDE) took place for some period between inflation and Big Bang Nucleosynthes…
In our previous paper [1], we studied a model of dark matter (DM) in which the hidden sector interacts with standard model particles via a hidden photonic portal (HP). We investigated the effects of this new interaction on the hydrogen atom and obtained an upper bound for the coupling of the model. In this work, we study the effects of HP on two interesting exotic atoms namely muonium and positronium. We obtain a tighter upper limit on the coupling. We also calculate the change (shift) in the Aharonov-Bohm phase due to HP and find that the phase shift is negligibly small (for DM particles mass…
We study a simple model in which the recently reported 750 GeV diphoton excess arises from a composite pseudo Nambu-Goldstone boson---hidden pion---produced by gluon fusion and decaying into two photons. The model only introduces an extra hidden gauge group at the TeV scale with a vectorlike quark in the bifundamental representation of the hidden and standard model gauge groups. We calculate the masses of all the hidden pions and analyze their experimental signatures and constraints. We find that two colored hidden pions must be near the current experimental limits, and hence are probed in the…
We show that dark matter could be made of massive gauge bosons whose stability doesn't require to impose by hand any discrete or global symmetry. Stability of gauge bosons can be guaranteed by the custodial symmetry associated to the gauge symmetry and particle content of the model. The particle content we consider to this end is based on a hidden sector made of a vector multiplet associated to a non-abelian gauge group and of a scalar multiplet charged under this gauge group. The hidden sector interacts with the Standard Model particles through the Higgs portal quartic scalar interaction in s…
