Searching for top flavor violating resonances

Abstract

We study new top flavor violating resonances that are singly produced in association with a top at the LHC. Such top flavor violating states could be responsible for the Tevatron top forward-backward asymmetry. Since top flavor violating states can directly decay to a top (or antitop) and jet, and are produced in conjunction with another (oppositely charged) top, the direct signature of such states is a tj (or t̄j) resonance in tt̄ j events. In general, these states can be very light and have O(1) couplings to the top sector so that they are copiously produced. We present a search strategy and estimate the discovery potential at the early LHC by implementing the strategy on simulated data. For example, with 1  fb^(−1) at 7 TeV, we estimate that a W′ coupling to d_Rt̄_R can be constrained at the 3σ level for g_R=1 and m_W′=200  GeV, weakening to g_R=1.75 for m_W′=600  GeV. With the search we advocate here, a bound at a similar level could be obtained for top flavor violating Z′s, as well as triplet and sextet diquarks.

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