LHC signals of T-odd heavy quarks in the Littlest Higgs model

Abstract

Recently proposed Little Higgs models present a viable solution to the naturalness problem of the Standard Model. An additional discrete symmetry, called T-parity, has been included in the simplest Little Higgs models to evade the constraints arising from electroweak precision data. The Littlest Higgs model with T-parity (LHT) not only predicts a set of new fermions in addition to the heavy gauge bosons of the original Little Higgs model, but also provides a new candidate for dark matter. In this paper, we study two particularly interesting signatures of T-odd fermion pair production at the LHC, namely, (a) jj + l^+ l^- + missing E_T and (b) jj + b \bar b + l^\pm + missing E_T. Using a parton level Monte Carlo event generator, we evaluate both the signal as well as the standard model background profile for a selected set of model parameters thereby developing a good discriminator. Finally, we scan the parameter space and delineate the possible discovery region in the same.