Search for; ; b; ; -hadron decays to long-lived particles in the CMS endcap muon detectors Journal Article

Overview

; A search for long-lived particles originating from the decay of; ; b; ; hadrons produced in proton-proton collisions with a center-of-mass energy of 13 TeV at the LHC is presented. The analysis is performed on a dataset recorded in 2018, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of; ; 41.6; ; ; ; fb; ; −; 1; ; ; ; . Interactions of the long-lived particles in the CMS endcap muon system would create hadronic or electromagnetic showers, producing clusters of detector hits. Selected events contain at least one such high-multiplicity cluster in the muon endcaps and require the presence of a displaced muon. The most stringent upper limits to date on the branching fraction; ; B; (; B; →; K; Φ; ); ; , where the long-lived particle; ; Φ; ; decays to a pair of hadrons, are obtained for; ; Φ; ; masses of 0.3–3.0 GeV and; ; Φ; ; mean proper decay lengths in the range of 1–500 cm.;

Hayrapetyan A; Makarenko V; Tumasyan A; Adam W; Andrejkovic JW; Benato L; Bergauer T; Dragicevic M; Giordano C; Hussain PS