arXiv subjects

Lorenzo Ricci

Publications and source records attributed to Lorenzo Ricci.

17 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

Bump Hunting Inside Jets with Energy Correlators

Energy correlators exhibit well-understood scaling behavior in the collinear limit, governed by perturbative QCD dynamics. We explore how this scaling regime is broken by new physics, converting precise energy correlator measurements into a broadband search for new physics. Under generic assumptions, unitarity and positivity are sufficient to classify and constrain the relevant signatures, which imprint an angular resonance on top of this smoothly scaling background. This converts the search into bump hunting within jets. As a proof of principle, we derive projected LHC sensitivity for a light hadrophilic $Z'$, finding competitive constraints with existing searches.

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arXiv2026

Energy Correlators in Warped Geometries

We study Energy Correlators as probes of strongly-coupled nearly-conformal field theories within their holographically dual descriptions, focusing on the important features that appear in realistic theories going beyond the standard model. In particular, we study warped geometries which asymptote to $\text{AdS}_5$, as well as IR-truncations dual to a 4D gap. Our correlators are computed by in-in type Witten perturbative diagrams, corresponding to a large-N expansion of the strong dynamics. We describe how this sets the stage for phenomenological applications for collider searches beyond the standard model as well as for new theoretical explorations in Lorentzian holography.

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arXiv2025

Partial Compositeness: from Anarchy to Symmetry

Within the Composite Higgs paradigm, Partial Compositeness has emerged as an elegant mechanism for generating large flavor hierarchies such as are observed in the quark and lepton masses and mixings. This mechanism exploits the strong renormalization group effects of the compositeness dynamics when these are {\it not} flavor-symmetric. Despite its remarkable properties, at this point it is stringently constrained by the body of flavor- and CP-violation tests, so that the compositeness scale must be at least $O(100)$ TeV, beyond the direct reach of proposed colliders. On the other hand, Composite Higgs theories with flavor-symmetric strong dynamics, but with realistic flavor-violating hierarchies introduced in an ad hoc manner, can extend the GIM mechanism of the standard model and thereby be far less constrained, at the edge of LHC reach and well within reach of future colliders. We show how the best features of both these types of dynamics can be combined if flavor-symmetries of the strong composite dynamics are emergent in the IR near the compositeness scale but absent in the far UV. In this case, flavor hierarchies can be generated by the renormalization group flow in the UV, followed by an IR stage in which the dynamics flows towards accidental flavor and CP symmetries. We point out how the collider and low-energy phenomenology is significantly impacted by the IR stage. Our analysis includes a discussion of the distinctive features of the small neutrino masses and their large mixings.

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arXiv2025

Exploring the Flavor Symmetry Landscape

We explore flavor dynamics in the broad scenario of a strongly interacting light Higgs (SILH). Our study focuses on the mechanism of partial fermion compositeness, but is otherwise as systematic as possible. Concretely, we classify the options for the underlying flavor (and CP) symmetries, which are necessary in order to bring this scenario safely within the range of present or future explorations. Our main goal in this context is to provide a practical map between the space of hypotheses (the models) and the experimental ground that will be explored in the medium and long term, in both indirect and direct searches, in practice at HL-LHC and Belle II, in EDM searches and eventually at FCC-hh. Our study encompasses scenarios with the maximal possible flavor symmetry, corresponding to minimal flavor violation (MFV), scenarios with no symmetry, corresponding to the so-called flavor anarchy, and various intermediate cases that complete the picture. One main result is that the scenarios that allow for the lowest new physics scale have intermediate flavor symmetry rather than the maximal symmetry of MFV models. Such optimal models are rather resilient to indirect exploration via flavor and CP violating observables, and can only be satisfactorily explored at a future high-energy collider. On the other hand, the next two decades of indirect exploration will significantly stress the parameter space of a large swath of less optimal but more generic models up to mass scales competing with those of the FCC-hh.

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arXiv2025

Conformal Collider Physics at Large Charge

We study energy correlators and other event shapes in states created by operators with large global $U(1)$ charge $Q$ in Conformal Field Theories. Focusing on theories whose large charge sector is described by the superfluid Effective Field Theory (EFT), we develop a systematic framework to compute event shapes within the EFT. As formerly observed, event shapes at leading order in $1/Q$ factorize into a product of classical expectation values determined by symmetry. In contrast, the subleading contribution to energy-energy and charge-charge correlators is a nontrivial prediction of the EFT, which we compute explicitly. Our results reveal a sharp collinear enhancement of the correlation between detectors, induced by the propagation of sound. We also generalize our findings to a broad class of event shapes.

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arXiv2024

Vector Portals at Future Lepton Colliders

We assess the sensitivity of future lepton colliders to weakly coupled vector dark portals (aka ``$ Z' $ bosons'') with masses ranging from tens of GeV to a few TeV. Our analysis focuses on dark photons and $ L_μ - L_τ $ gauge bosons. We consider both visible and invisible decay channels. We demonstrate that both high energy $μ$ colliders and future $ e^+e^- $ colliders, using the FCC-ee $Z$-pole and $ZH$ operation modes as a benchmark, offer significant improvements in sensitivity. We find that both colliders can enhance the sensitivity to $ L_μ - L_τ $ bosons (for both visible and invisible decays) and to invisibly decaying dark photons by 1--2 orders of magnitude across the relevant mass range. Furthermore, we study the impact of forward $ μ$ detectors at the $ μ$-collider on the sensitivity to both models.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2024

Low-virtuality splitting in the Standard Model

When the available collision energy is much above the mass of the particles involved, scattering amplitudes feature kinematic configurations that are enhanced by the much lower virtuality of some intermediate particle. Such configurations generally factorise in terms of a hard scattering amplitude with exactly on-shell intermediate particle, times universal factors. In the case of real radiation emission, such factors are splitting amplitudes that describe the creation or the annihilation -- for initial or final state splittings -- of the low-virtuality particle and the creation of the real radiation particles. We compute at tree-level the amplitudes describing all the splittings that take place in the Standard Model when the collision energy is much above the electroweak scale. Unlike previous results, our splitting amplitudes fully describe the low-virtuality kinematic regime, which includes the region of collinear splitting, of soft emission, and combinations thereof. The splitting amplitudes are compactly represented as little-group tensors in an improved bi-spinor formalism for massive spin-1 particles that automatically incorporates the Goldstone Boson Equivalence Theorem. Simple explicit expressions are obtained using a suitably defined infinite-momentum helicity basis representation of the spinor variables. Our results, combined with the known virtual contributions, could enable systematic predictions of the leading electroweak radiation effects in high-energy scattering processes, with particularly promising phenomenological applications to the physics of future colliders with very high energy such as a muon collider.

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arXiv2024

"Unification" of BSM Searches and SM Measurements: the case of lepton$+MET$ and $m_W$

We develop the idea that the unprecedented precision in Standard Model (SM) measurements, with further improvement at the HL-LHC, enables new searches for physics Beyond the Standard Model (BSM).As an illustration, we demonstrate that the measured kinematic distributions of the lepton$+MET$ final state not only determine the mass of the $W$ boson, but are also sensitive to light new physics. Such a search for new physics thus requires a simultaneous fit to the BSM and SM parameters, "unifying" searches and measurements at the LHC and Tevatron. In this paper, we complete the program initiated in our earlier work arXiv:2310.13687. In particular, we analyze ($i$) novel decay modes of the $W$ boson with a neutrinophilic invisible scalar or with a heavy neutrino; ($ii$) modified production of $W$ bosons, namely, associated with a hadrophilic invisible $Z^\prime$ gauge boson; and ($iii$) scenarios without an on-shell $W$ boson, such as slepton-sneutrino production in the Minimal Supersymmetric Standard Model (MSSM). Here, we complement our previous MSSM analysis in arXiv:2310.13687 by considering a different kinematic region. Our results highlight that new physics can still be directly discovered at the LHC, including light new physics,via SM precision measurements. Furthermore, we illustrate that such BSM signals are subtle, yet potentially large enough to affect the precision measurements of SM parameters themselves, such as the $W$ boson mass.

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arXiv2023

Boundaries of Universal Theories

Universal theories are a broad class of well-motivated microscopic dynamics of the electroweak sector that go beyond the Standard Model description. The long distance physics is described by electroweak parameters which correspond to local operators in the Effective Field Theory. We show how unitarity and analyticity constrain the space of parameters. In particular, the $W$ and $Y$ parameters are constrained to be positive and are necessarily the leading terms in the low energy expansion. We assess the impact of unitarity on the interpretation of Drell-Yan data. In passing, we uncover an unexpected Wilson coefficient transcendental cancellation at the $\mathcal{O}(<10^{-3})$ level.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2023

A new purpose for the $W$-boson mass measurement: searching for New Physics in lepton+$MET$

We show that the $m_W$ measurement is a direct probe of New Physics (NP) contributing to lepton and missing transverse momentum ($\ell+MET$), independently from indirect tests via the electroweak fit. Such NP modifies the kinematic distributions used to extract $m_W$, necessitating a simultaneous fit to $m_W$ and NP. This effect can in principle bias the $m_W$ measurement, but only to a limited extent for our considered models. Given that, we demonstrate that the agreement at high-precision with SM-predicted shapes results in bounds competitive to, if not exceeding, existing ones for two examples: anomalous $W$ decay involving a $L_μ - L_τ$ gauge boson and $\tildeν_{l} \tilde{l}$ production in the MSSM.

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arXiv2022

Energy Correlators of Hadronically Decaying Electroweak Bosons

Energy correlators are field-theoretically clean and phenomenologically valuable probes of QCD dynamics. We explore the possibility of using the information encoded in the energy correlators of a hadronically decaying electroweak vector boson in order to extract its full decay density matrix. The kinematics of the one- and two-point energy correlators can indeed discriminate between longitudinal and transverse modes and reveal the interference pattern between different vector polarizations. Such observables improve the sensitivity to microscopic new physics affecting the production rate of the different helicities. We assess the impact on higher dimensional EFT operators in simple scenarios.

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arXiv2022

Muon Collider Physics Summary

The perspective of designing muon colliders with high energy and luminosity, which is being investigated by the International Muon Collider Collaboration, has triggered a growing interest in their physics reach. We present a concise summary of the muon colliders potential to explore new physics, leveraging on the unique possibility of combining high available energy with very precise measurements.

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arXiv2022

The physics case of a 3 TeV muon collider stage

In the path towards a muon collider with center of mass energy of 10 TeV or more, a stage at 3 TeV emerges as an appealing option. Reviewing the physics potential of such muon collider is the main purpose of this document. In order to outline the progression of the physics performances across the stages, a few sensitivity projections for higher energy are also presented. There are many opportunities for probing new physics at a 3 TeV muon collider. Some of them are in common with the extensively documented physics case of the CLIC 3 TeV energy stage, and include measuring the Higgs trilinear coupling and testing the possible composite nature of the Higgs boson and of the top quark at the 20 TeV scale. Other opportunities are unique of a 3 TeV muon collider, and stem from the fact that muons are collided rather than electrons. This is exemplified by studying the potential to explore the microscopic origin of the current $g$-2 and $B$-physics anomalies, which are both related with muons.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2022

Learning from Radiation at a Very High Energy Lepton Collider

We study the potential of lepton collisions with about $10\text{ TeV}$ center of mass energy to probe Electroweak, Higgs and Top short-distance physics at the $100\text{ TeV}$ scale, pointing out the interplay with the long-distance ($100\text{ GeV}$) phenomenon of Electroweak radiation. On one hand, we find that sufficiently accurate theoretical predictions require the resummed inclusion of radiation effects, which we perform at the double logarithmic order. On the other hand, we notice that short-distance physics does influence the emission of Electroweak radiation. Therefore the investigation of the radiation pattern can enhance the sensitivity to new short-distance physical laws. We illustrate these aspects by studying Effective Field Theory contact interactions in di-fermion and di-boson production, and comparing cross-section measurements that require or that exclude the emission of massive Electroweak bosons. The combination of the two types of measurements is found to enhance the sensitivity to the new interactions. Based on these results, we perform sensitivity projections to Higgs and Top Compositeness and to minimal $Z'$ new physics scenarios at future muon colliders.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2021

High-energy EFT probes with fully differential Drell-Yan measurements

We study the potential of fully-differential measurements of high-energy dilepton cross-sections at the LHC to probe heavy new physics encapsulated in dimension-6 interaction operators. The assessment is performed in the seven-dimensional parameter space of operators that induce energy-growing corrections to the Standard Model partonic cross-sections at the interference level, and in the two-dimensional subspace associated with the W and Y parameters. A considerable sensitivity improvement is found relative to single-differential measurements, owing to the possibility of probing at the interference level more directions in the seven-dimensional parameter space. The reduction of parton distribution function uncertainties in the fully-differential fit is also found to play a significant role. The results are interpreted in the minimal Z' new-physics model, providing a concrete illustration of the advantages of the fully-differential analysis. We find that high-energy dilepton measurements can extend the Z' exclusion and discovery potential well beyond the reach of direct searches in a large region of the parameter space.

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arXiv2021

On the W&Y interpretation of high-energy Drell-Yan measurements

High-energy neutral and charged Drell--Yan differential cross-section measurements are powerful probes of quark-lepton contact interactions that produce growing-with-energy effects. This paper provides theoretical predictions of the new physics effects at the Next-to-Leading order in QCD and including one-loop EW corrections at the single-logarithm accuracy. The predictions are obtained from SM Monte Carlo simulations through analytic reweighting. This eliminates the need of performing a scan on the new physics parameter space, enabling the global exploration of all the relevant interactions. Furthermore, our strategy produces consistently showered events to be employed for a direct comparison of the new physics predictions with the data, or to validate the unfolding procedure than underlies the cross-section measurements. Two particularly relevant interactions, associated with the W and Y parameters of EW precision tests, are selected for illustration. Projections are presented for the sensitivity of the LHC and of the HL-LHC measurements. The impact on the sensitivity of several sources of uncertainties is quantified.

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arXiv2020

TailCoR

Economic and financial crises are characterised by unusually large events. These tail events co-move because of linear and/or nonlinear dependencies. We introduce TailCoR, a metric that combines (and disentangles) these linear and non-linear dependencies. TailCoR between two variables is based on the tail inter quantile range of a simple projection. It is dimension-free, it performs well in small samples, and no optimisations are needed.

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