New exclusion limits on dark gauge forces from proton Bremsstrahlung in beam-dump data

TLDR

Proton‑beam‑dump data from the U70 accelerator have previously been used to search for axions, light Higgs bosons, and dark photons produced via π⁰ decay. The study re‑analyzes U70 proton‑beam‑dump data to set new mass‑coupling limits for dark gauge forces, extending exclusions up to 624 MeV with ε≈10⁻⁶. The authors employ high‑energy Bremsstrahlung of the dark photon from the initial proton beam and various detection methods in the ν‑calorimeter I experiment to derive the limits. References [1] and [2].

Abstract

We re-analyze published proton beam dump data taken at the U70 accelerator at IHEP Serpukhov with the ν-calorimeter I experiment in 1989 to set mass-coupling limits for dark gauge forces. The corresponding data have been used for axion and light Higgs particle searches in Refs. [1], [2] before. More recently, limits on dark gauge forces have been derived from this data set, considering a dark photon production from π0-decay [3]. Here we determine extended mass and coupling exclusion bounds for dark gauge bosons ranging to masses mγ′ of 624MeV at admixture parameters ε≃10−6 considering high-energy Bremsstrahlung of the γ′-boson off the initial proton beam and different detection mechanisms.