SEARCH FOR EXCITED MUONS AT THE FUTURE SPPC-BASED MUON-PROTON COLLIDERS

Abstract

We have investigated the production potential of the spin-1/2 excited muons, predicted by preonic models, at the four SPPC (Super Proton- Proton Collider)-based muon-proton colliders in different center-of-mass energies. For the signal process mu p -> mu*X -> mu gamma X, the production cross section and the decay width values of the excited muons have been calculated. The pseudorapidity and transverse momentum distributions of muons and photons in the final state have been obtained in order to choose the kinematical cuts best suited for enhancing the statistical signal of the excited muon signature. By applying these cuts, we report the discovery, observation and exclusion mass limits of the excited muons for two compositeness scale values, which are an energy level at which new interactions are expected to occur. It is shown that the discovery limits on the excited muons in the case the compositeness scale equals 100 TeV are 2.7, 3.9, 3.1 and 6.7 TeV for center-of-mass energies of 10.3, 14.2, 14.6 and 20.2 TeV, respectively.