How to Search for a Light Stop at the Tevatron

Abstract

We describe a method for searching for a light stop squark [M(stop)+M(LSP)<M(t)] at the Fermilab Tevatron. Traditional searches rely upon stringent background-reducing cuts which, unfortunately, leave very few signal events given the present data set. To avoid this difficulty, we suggest using a milder set of cuts, combined with a ``superweight,&#39;&#39; whose purpose is to discriminate between signal and background. The superweight consists of a sum of terms (each of which are either zero or one) assigned event-by-event depending upon the values of various observables. By construction, the superweight ``large&#39;&#39; for the signal and ``small&#39;&#39; for the background. We apply this method to the detection of stops coming from top decay. It is straightforward to adapt our method to other processes.