Simulating Light Dark Matter Signals at SHiP
Publicerad
Författare
Typ
Examensarbete för masterexamen
Master's Thesis
Master's Thesis
Program
Modellbyggare
Tidskriftstitel
ISSN
Volymtitel
Utgivare
Sammanfattning
Dark matter remains one of the most compelling mysteries in modern physics, with
a wide range of astrophysical and cosmological observations providing strong evidence
for its existence. Among the many proposed candidates, light dark matter,
with masses below the GeV scale, has gained increasing interest, partly due to its
accessibility in current and next-generation accelerator-based experiments. An interesting
framework for light dark matter involves a massive dark photon mediator
A′, which kinetically mixes with the Standard Model photon, enabling interactions
between the visible and dark sectors.
This thesis focuses on the sensitivity of the SHiP (Search for Hidden Particles)
experiment – a planned proton beam-dump experiment at the CERN Super-Proton-
Synchrotron (SPS) – to light dark matter scenarios. This experiment is designed
to probe feebly interacting particles and is expected to significantly extend the
parameter space coverage for light dark sector particles. The analysis adopts a
benchmark model characterized by a minimal dark sector with a complex scalar
dark matter candidate χ, a dark coupling αD = 0.1, and a mediator mass set to
mA′ = 3mχ.
Simulations are performed using two independent tools: BdNMC, a standalone
dark matter Monte Carlo generator, and MadDump, a plugin for the Mad-
Graph5_aMC@NLO framework tailored for beam dump and fixed-target experiments.
A comparative analysis of these tools is conducted in the context of
the complex scalar model, highlighting methodological differences and their impact
on predicted signal rates. Furthermore, the sensitivity studies for the SHiP experiment
are extended to fermionic dark matter scenarios, including both Dirac and
Majorana candidates, resulting in updated exclusion contours and emphasizing the
experiment’s discovery potential across these different dark matter hypotheses.
Beskrivning
Ämne/nyckelord
Light Dark Matter (LDM), Dark Photon, Beam Dump Experiments, SHiP, Hidden Sector, Dark Sector, BdNMC, MadDump, Dark Matter Simulations, Beyond Standard Model (BSM)