This study explores the diphoton and $b\bar{b}$ excesses at 95.4 GeV, as well as nano-Hertz gravitational waves originating from domain walls, within the framework of the next-to-two-Higgs-doublet model (N2HDM), which extends the two-Higgs-doublet model by introducing a real singlet scalar subject to a discrete $Z_2$ symmetry. The $Z_2$ symmetry is spontaneously broken by the non-zero vacuum expectation value of the singlet scalar, $v_s$ , which leads to the formation of domain walls. Two different scenarios are discussed: in scenario A, the 95.4 GeV Higgs boson predominantly originates from the singlet field, while in scenario B, it arises mainly from the CP-even components of the Higgs doublets. Accounting for relevant theoretical and experimental constraints, scenario A can fully account for both the diphoton and $b\bar{b}$ excesses at 95.4 GeV within the $1\sigma$ range. In the parameter space accommodating both excesses, scenario A fails to provide a valid explanation for the NANOGrav data up to $v_s=$ 1000 TeV, and the predicted gravitational wave spectrum can exceed the SKA sensitivity curve in the low frequency region. Scenario B only marginally accounts for the diphoton and $b\bar{b}$ excesses at the $1\sigma$ level, but can simultaneously explain the NANOGrav data well.

China

Haotian Xu

Yufei Wang

Xiao-Fang Han

Lei Wang

95 GeV Higgs boson and nano-Hertz gravitational waves from domain walls in the next-to-two-Higgs-doublet model * Supported by the Shandong Provincial Natural Science Foundation Projects ( ZR2024MA001, ZR2023MA038) and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (11975013)

Electroweak (EW) amplitudes in the gauge-Goldstone five-component formalism have a distinctive property: gauge symmetry is imprinted in the amplitudes, manifested as the massive Ward identity (MWI) $ k^M{\cal{M}}_M=0 $ . In this study, we used the HELAS package to numerically study gauge symmetry in EW amplitudes. First, we directly tested gauge symmetry by examining the MWI of amplitudes. Second, we modified the couplings within a vertex and among vertices to check if and how the MWI changes. Third, we tested gauge symmetry by considering the couplings modified by operators from the standard model effective field theory (SMEFT). Similar to the standard model, there are relations between different couplings that are protected by gauge symmetry. We observed that, if we modify the couplings to deviate from the relations, the MWI is violated. In contrast, the MWI is restored when the relations between couplings reduce to those in the SMEFT.

Wang-Fa Li

Junmou Chen

Qian-Jiu Wang

Zhao-Huan Yu

Numerical study on the gauge symmetry of electroweak amplitudes * Junmou Chen is supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China (12205118), Wang-Fa Li, Qian-Jiu Wang, and Zhao-Huan Yu are supported by the Guangzhou Science and Technology Planning Project (2024A04J4026)

We present a search for light dark matter particles through their interactions with atomic electrons and nucleons, utilizing PandaX-4T data with an effective exposure of <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" display="inline"><mrow><mn>1.04</mn><mtext> </mtext><mtext> </mtext><mi>tonne</mi><mo>·</mo><mi>year</mi></mrow></math> for ionization-only data and <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" display="inline"><mrow><mn>1.20</mn><mtext> </mtext><mtext> </mtext><mi>tonne</mi><mo>·</mo><mi>year</mi></mrow></math> for paired data. Our analysis focuses on the energy range (efficiency <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" display="inline"><mo>&gt;</mo><mn>0.01</mn></math>) of approximately 0.33 to 3 keV for nuclear recoils and from 0.04 to 0.39 keV for electronic recoils. We establish the most stringent constraints on spin-independent dark matter-nucleon interactions within a mass range of <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" display="inline"><mrow><mn>2.5</mn><mi>–</mi><mn>5.0</mn><mtext> </mtext><mtext> </mtext><mi>GeV</mi><mo>/</mo><msup><mrow><mi>c</mi></mrow><mrow><mn>2</mn></mrow></msup></mrow></math>, spin-dependent neutron-only interactions within <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" display="inline"><mrow><mn>1.0</mn><mi>–</mi><mn>5.6</mn><mtext> </mtext><mtext> </mtext><mi>GeV</mi><mo>/</mo><msup><mrow><mi>c</mi></mrow><mrow><mn>2</mn></mrow></msup></mrow></math>, and spin-dependent proton-only interactions within <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" display="inline"><mrow><mn>1.0</mn><mi>–</mi><mn>4.1</mn><mtext> </mtext><mtext> </mtext><mi>GeV</mi><mo>/</mo><msup><mrow><mi>c</mi></mrow><mrow><mn>2</mn></mrow></msup></mrow></math>. Their corresponding limits at <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" display="inline"><mrow><mn>3</mn><mtext> </mtext><mtext> </mtext><mi>GeV</mi><mo>/</mo><msup><mrow><mi>c</mi></mrow><mrow><mn>2</mn></mrow></msup></mrow></math> are <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" display="inline"><mn>1.1</mn><mo>×</mo><msup><mn>10</mn><mrow><mo>−</mo><mn>43</mn></mrow></msup></math>, <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" display="inline"><mn>8.4</mn><mo>×</mo><msup><mn>10</mn><mrow><mo>−</mo><mn>40</mn></mrow></msup></math>, and <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" display="inline"><mrow><mn>2.8</mn><mo>×</mo><msup><mrow><mn>10</mn></mrow><mrow><mo>−</mo><mn>38</mn></mrow></msup><mtext> </mtext><mtext> </mtext><msup><mrow><mi>cm</mi></mrow><mrow><mn>2</mn></mrow></msup></mrow></math>, respectively. Additionally, our results improve the upper limits on the dark matter-electron scattering cross section by a factor of 1.5 and 9.3 for heavy and light mediator scenarios, respectively, within <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" display="inline"><mn>50</mn><mtext> </mtext><mtext> </mtext><mi>MeV</mi><mo>/</mo><msup><mi>c</mi><mn>2</mn></msup></math> to <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" display="inline"><mn>10</mn><mtext> </mtext><mtext> </mtext><mi>GeV</mi><mo>/</mo><msup><mi>c</mi><mn>2</mn></msup></math>, compared with previous best results. The improved limits reach <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" display="inline"><mn>1.5</mn><mo>×</mo><mrow><msup><mrow><mn>10</mn></mrow><mrow><mo>−</mo><mn>41</mn></mrow></msup></mrow></math> and <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" display="inline"><mrow><mn>5.6</mn><mo>×</mo><mrow><msup><mrow><mn>10</mn></mrow><mrow><mo>−</mo><mn>37</mn></mrow></msup><mtext> </mtext><mtext> </mtext><msup><mrow><mi>cm</mi></mrow><mrow><mn>2</mn></mrow></msup></mrow></mrow></math> at <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" display="inline"><mn>200</mn><mtext> </mtext><mtext> </mtext><mi>MeV</mi><mo>/</mo><msup><mi>c</mi><mn>2</mn></msup></math> for the heavy and light mediators, respectively.

Minzhen Zhang

Zihao Bo

Wei Chen

Xun Chen

Yunhua Chen

Chen Cheng

Xiangyi Cui

Manna Deng

Yingjie Fan

Deqing Fang

Xuanye Fu

Zhixing Gao

Yujie Ge

Lisheng Geng

Karl Giboni

Xunan Guo

Xuyuan Guo

Zichao Guo

Chencheng Han

Ke Han

Changda He

Jinrong He

Houqi Huang

Junting Huang

Yule Huang

Ruquan Hou

United States

Xiangdong Ji

Yonglin Ju

Xiaorun Lan

Chenxiang Li

Jiafu Li

Mingchuan Li

Peiyuan Li

Shuaijie Li

Tao Li

Yangdong Li

Zhiyuan Li

Qing Lin

Jianglai Liu

Yuanchun Liu

Congcong Lu

Xiaoying Lu

Lingyin Luo

Yunyang Luo

Yugang Ma

Yajun Mao

Yue Meng

Binyu Pang

Ningchun Qi

Zhicheng Qian

Xiangxiang Ren

Dong Shan

Xiaofeng Shang

Xiyuan Shao

Guofang Shen

Manbin Shen

Wenliang Sun

Xuyan Sun

Yi Tao

Yueqiang Tian

Yuxin Tian

Anqing Wang

Guanbo Wang

Hao Wang

Haoyu Wang

Jiamin Wang

Meng Wang

Qiuhong Wang

Shaobo Wang

Shibo Wang

Siguang Wang

Wei Wang

Xu Wang

Zhou Wang

Yuehuan Wei

Weihao Wu

Yuan Wu

Mengjiao Xiao

Xiang Xiao

Kaizhi Xiong

Jianqin Xu

Yifan Xu

Shunyu Yao

Binbin Yan

Xiyu Yan

Yong Yang

Peihua Ye

Chunxu Yu

Ying Yuan

Zhe Yuan

Youhui Yun

Xinning Zeng

Peng Zhang

Shibo Zhang

Siyuan Zhang

Shu Zhang

Tao Zhang

Wei Zhang

Yang Zhang

Search for Light Dark Matter with 259 Days of Data in PandaX-4T

We develop a framework based on the full one-loop finite-temperature effective potential model, within which the bubble wall velocity is calculated using the local thermal equilibrium (LTE) approximation, and the kinetic energy fraction $\textit{K}$ is computed directly. In cosmological phase transitions, these quantities play a critical role in determining the resulting gravitational wave signals. Using the xSM as a benchmark model, we compute the peak gravitational wave spectra under different methods for determining the wall velocity and the kinetic energy fraction $\textit{K}$, and compare these results to those obtained using the commonly employed bag model. Within the scanned parameter space, we find: (1) Deflagration is the most prevalent mode of fluid motion.(2) Gravitational wave spectra based on the full effective potential with LTE-derived wall velocity and integrated $\textit{K}$ can differ significantly from those using the bag model with fitted $\textit{K}$. In the deflagration regime, discrepancies reach up to 48% in peak frequency and 90% in amplitude. (3) The bag model provides a good approximation to the full equation of state in many cases. Notably, in deflagration scenarios with input wall velocity, the gravitational wave spectra obtained from the bag model more closely resemble the LTE-based results than those derived using the full potential with this input wall velocity ( ).

Zongguo Si

Hongxin Wang

Yang Xiao

The bubble wall velocity in local thermal equilibrium and energy budget with full effective potential

We study $ \cos2\phi $ azimuthal asymmetry in doubly longitudinally polarized proton-proton Drell-Yan collisions within the transverse momentum dependent factorization framework. The asymmetry arises from the convolution of the longitudinal transversity distribution $ h_{1L}^{\perp} $ for both protons. Using the Bacchetta-Delcarro-Pisano-Radici-Signori parameterization for the nonperturbative Sudakov form factor and the Wandzura-Wilczek approximation for collinear $ h_{1L}^{\perp} $ , we predict the double spin asymmetry $ A_{LL}^{\cos2\phi} $ at RHIC and NICA kinematics. Our results demonstrate sensitivity to sea quark distributions, with the asymmetry reaching up to 25% for maximal sea quark contributions. These predictions highlight the potential of polarized Drell-Yan measurements to probe sea quark dynamics and advance our understanding of nucleon structures.

Hui Li

Ting Hu

Liang-Liang Liu

Xiao-Yu Wang

Zhun Lu

Asymmetry ${{\boldsymbol A}_{\boldsymbol{LL}}^{\bf\cos2\boldsymbol\phi}} $ in the polarized proton-proton Drell-Yan process within TMD factorization * Hui Li is supported by Fundamental Research Program of Shanxi Province (202203021222224) and Natural Science Foundation of Shanxi Normal University (JCYJ2023021). Xiao-Yu Wang is supported by the Natural Science Foundation of Henan Province (242300421377, 232300421140)

We propose a search strategy at the HL-LHC for a new neutral particle $\textit{X}$ that couples to $\textit{W}$-bosons, using the process $ p p \to W^{\pm} X (\to W^{+} W^{-}) $ with a tri-$\textit{W}$-boson final state. Focusing on events with two same-sign leptonic $\textit{W}$-boson decays into muons and a hadronically decaying $\textit{W}$-boson, our method leverages the enhanced signal-to-background discrimination achieved through a machine-learning-based multivariate analysis. Using the heavy photophobic axion-like particle (ALP) as a benchmark, we evaluate the discovery sensitivities on both production cross section times branching ratio $ \sigma(p p \to W^{\pm} X) \times \text{Br}(X \to W^{+} W^{-}) $ and the coupling $ g_{aWW} $ for particle mass over a wide range of 170–3000 GeV at the HL-LHC with center-of-mass energy $ \sqrt{s} = 14 \, \text{ TeV} $ and integrated luminosity $ {\cal{L}} = 3 \, \text{ab}^{-1} $ . Our results show significant improvements in discovery sensitivity, particularly for masses above 300 GeV, compared to existing limits derived from CMS analyses of Standard Model (SM) tri-$\textit{W}$-boson production at $ \sqrt{s} = 13 \, \text{ TeV} $ . This study demonstrates the potential of advanced selection techniques in probing the coupling of new particles to $\textit{W}$-bosons and highlights the HL-LHC's capability to explore physics beyond the SM.

Ying-nan Mao

Kechen Wang

Yiheng Xiong

Sensitivities of new resonance couplings to $\textit{W}$-bosons at the LHC * Ying-nan Mao and Yihen Xiong are supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (12205227). Kechen Wang is supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (11905162), the Excellent Young Talents Program of the Wuhan University of Technology (40122102), and the research program of the Wuhan University of Technology (2020IB024). The simulation and analysis work of this article was completed with the computational cluster provided by the Theoretical Physics Group at the Department of Physics, School of Physics and Mechanics, Wuhan University of Technology

The production of heavy-quark (HQ) jets is a new area that addresses the mass effect of jet quenching in heavy-ion physics. This paper presents a theoretical study of HQ jet yield suppression in Pb+Pb collisions at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) and focuses on the energy loss of HQ jets produced by different mechanisms. The $\textit{p+p}$ baseline is provided by the generator simulation of high-energy reactions of particles (SHERPA), and the jet-medium interactions are described by the SHELL transport model, which considers the elastic and inelastic partonic energy loss in the quark-gluon plasma (QGP). In $\textit{p+p}$ collisions, our numerical results indicate that the HQ jets from gluon splitting ( $ g \rightarrow Q $ -jet) are the dominant contribution at high $ p_T $ , displaying more dispersive structures than the HQ-initiated ( $ Q \rightarrow Q $ -jet). In nucleus-nucleus collisions, our calculations were consistent with the inclusive and b-jet $ R_{AA} $ recently measured by the ATLAS collaboration, revealing a remarkable manifestation of the mass effect of jet energy loss. As a result of the dispersive substructure, the $ g \rightarrow Q $ -jet loses more energy than the $ Q \rightarrow Q $ -jet in the QGP. Due to the significant contribution of $ g \rightarrow c $ -jet, the $ R_{AA} $ of $\textit{c}$-jet is comparable or even smaller than that of inclusive jet. To experimentally distinguish the $ g \rightarrow Q $ -jet and $ Q \rightarrow Q $ -jet, we propose event selection strategies based on their topological features and test their performances. By isolating the $ c \rightarrow c $ -jet, $ b \rightarrow b $ -jet, and the jets initiated by heavy quarks, we predicted that the order of their $ R_{AA} $ are in line with the mass hierarchy of energy loss. Future measurements on the $ R_{AA} $ of $ Q \rightarrow Q $ -jet and $ g \rightarrow Q $ -jet will provide a unique opportunity for testing the flavor/mass dependence of energy loss at the jet level.

Sa Wang

Shuang Li

Yao Li

Ben-Wei Zhang

Enke Wang

Probing the mass effect of heavy quark jets in high-energy nuclear collisions * Supported by the MajorProject of Basic and Applied Basic Research of Guangdong Province, China (2020B0301030008, 2023A1515011460), and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (11935007, 12035007, 12247127, 12375137). Sa Wang is supported by the Open Foundation of Key Laboratory of Quark and Lepton Physics (MOE) (QLPL2023P01) and the Talent Scientific Star-up Foundation of the China Three Gorges University, China (CTGU) (2024RCKJ013)

Detailed studies of two-neutrino double electron capture (2$\textit{ν}$DEC) is a crucial step towards searching for the neutrinoless mode to explore the Majorana nature of neutrinos. We have measured precisely the half-life of the 2$\textit{ν}$DEC process in Xe, utilizing a total exposure of 1.73 tonne year from the commissioning run and the first science run of the PandaX-4T experiment. A time-dependent background model in the $$ \mathcal{O} $$ (10 keV) energy is constructed for the first time in PandaX-4T data. With an unbinned maximum likelihood fit, we determine the half-life of the 2$\textit{ν}$DEC process to be (1.03 ± 0.15 ± 0.08 ) × 10 yr. Furthermore, we have evaluated the capture fraction for both electrons captured from the $\textit{K}$ shell ($\textit{KK}$) to be (65 ± 5)%, which aligns with the Xe nuclear model calculations within 1.8 $\textit{σ}$.

Zhaokan Cheng

Di Huang

Yu Hou

Xiangpan Ji

Wenbo Ma

Xuyang Ning

Xiuli Wang

Yingxin Zhang

Yuanyuan Zhang

Li Zhao

Jifang Zhou

Jiaxu Zhou

Jiayi Zhou

Ning Zhou

Xiaopeng Zhou

Yubo Zhou

Measurement of two-neutrino double electron capture half-life of

We perform a search of double beta decay of Xe to the excited state, $$ {0}_1^{+} $$ , of Ba (2$\textit{νββ}$- $$ {0}_1^{+} $$ ), using the dual-phase xenon detector of PandaX-4T with the first 94.9-day commissioning data. The multi-site events are reconstructed up to the MeV energy scale, which helps to improve the background model significantly. The background contribution from the stainless steel platform outside PandaX-4T cryostat is evaluated for the first time. No significant evidence for 2$\textit{νββ}$- $$ {0}_1^{+} $$ is observed, resulting in a lower limit on half-life of 7$\textit{.}$5 × 10 yr at the 90% confidence level. This is the first experimental limit on such a rare decay in a natural xenon-based detector.

Zhizhen Zhou

Search for double beta decay of

This paper presents a phenomenological study on the angle between the standard and winner-take-all (WTA) jet axes <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mrow><mo>(</mo><mi mathvariant="normal">Δ</mi><msubsup><mi>R</mi><mrow><mi>axis</mi></mrow><mrow><mi>WTA</mi><mtext>–</mtext><mi>Std</mi></mrow></msubsup><mo>)</mo></mrow></math> in high-energy nuclear collisions. The <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mrow><mi>p</mi><mo>+</mo><mi>p</mi></mrow></math> baseline is provided by the Pythia8 event generator. The in-medium jet propagation is simulated by the linear Boltzmann transport (Lbt) model, which considers both the elastic and inelastic jet-medium interactions. Our theoretical results calculated by the Lbt model show that the <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mrow><mi mathvariant="normal">Δ</mi><msubsup><mi>R</mi><mrow><mi>axis</mi></mrow><mrow><mi>WTA</mi><mtext>–</mtext><mi>Std</mi></mrow></msubsup></mrow></math> distribution in <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mrow><mi>Pb</mi><mo>+</mo><mi>Pb</mi></mrow></math> at <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mrow><msqrt><mi>s</mi></msqrt><mo>=</mo><mn>5.02</mn><mspace width="0.16em"></mspace><mi>TeV</mi></mrow></math> is narrower than that in <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mrow><mi>p</mi><mo>+</mo><mi>p</mi></mrow></math>, which agrees well with the recent ALICE measurements. The narrowing of <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mrow><mi mathvariant="normal">Δ</mi><msubsup><mi>R</mi><mrow><mi>axis</mi></mrow><mrow><mi>WTA</mi><mtext>–</mtext><mi>Std</mi></mrow></msubsup></mrow></math>, which seems to violate the nature of intrajet broadening due to jet quenching, may be attributed to the influence of “selection bias.” However, the physical details still need to be fully understood. Utilizing a matching-jet method to track the jet evolution in the QGP to remove the selection bias in the Monte Carlo simulations, we observe that the <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mrow><mi mathvariant="normal">Δ</mi><msubsup><mi>R</mi><mrow><mi>axis</mi></mrow><mrow><mi>WTA</mi><mtext>–</mtext><mi>Std</mi></mrow></msubsup></mrow></math> distribution becomes broader due to the jet-medium interactions. At the same time, by rescaling the quark- and gluon-jet fractions in <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mrow><mi>Pb</mi><mo>+</mo><mi>Pb</mi></mrow></math> collisions to be the same as that in <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mrow><mi>p</mi><mo>+</mo><mi>p</mi></mrow></math>, we find that the fraction change may not significantly influence the modification pattern of jet <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mrow><mi mathvariant="normal">Δ</mi><msubsup><mi>R</mi><mrow><mi>axis</mi></mrow><mrow><mi>WTA</mi><mtext>–</mtext><mi>Std</mi></mrow></msubsup></mrow></math>. On the other hand, the selected jet sample in <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mrow><mi mathvariant="normal">A</mi><mo>+</mo><mi mathvariant="normal">A</mi></mrow></math> collisions has a significantly narrower initial <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mrow><mi mathvariant="normal">Δ</mi><msubsup><mi>R</mi><mrow><mi>axis</mi></mrow><mrow><mi>WTA</mi><mtext>–</mtext><mi>Std</mi></mrow></msubsup></mrow></math> distribution than the <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mrow><mi>p</mi><mo>+</mo><mi>p</mi></mrow></math> baseline, and such a biased comparison between <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mrow><mi>p</mi><mo>+</mo><mi>p</mi></mrow></math> and <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mrow><mi mathvariant="normal">A</mi><mo>+</mo><mi mathvariant="normal">A</mi></mrow></math> conceals the actual intrajet broadening effect in the experimental measurements. The investigations presented in this paper will deepen our understanding of the relationship between the actual intrajet modifications in the QGP and the experimental observations.

Jin-Wen Kang

Phenomenological study of the angle between jet axes in heavy-ion collisions