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# Discovering anomaly-mediated supersymmetry at the LHC

## 1 Introduction

Weak scale supersymmetry (SUSY) is the most promising solution to the technical hierarchy problem of the Standard Model (SM). However supersymmetric partners of known particles have not yet been discovered by experiment so if SUSY exists it must be broken. Dynamical supersymmetry breaking is usually assumed to occur in a ‘hidden sector’ which is isolated from ordinary particles and interactions. It is then communicated to the fields of the minimal supersymmetric standard model (MSSM) by some messenger(s). This must be achieved while maintaining both the theoretically appealing aspects such as naturalness  and respecting experimental constraints on masses, flavour-changing neutral currents and CP violation.

SUSY breaking must be communicated to the observed particles by some interaction felt by both the visible and hidden sectors. The most commonly discussed methods have been flavour-blind gravitational (SUGRA), or gauge (GMSB) interactions.

More recently an alternative mechanism known as anomaly-mediation (AMSB) has been proposed in which a conformal anomaly in the auxiliary field of the supergravity multiplet transmits SUSY-breaking to the observable sector. There will be an anomaly-mediated contribution to the gaugino masses in any hidden-sector model, but where no other direct contribution is present AMSB will be the leading effect.

Anomaly mediation provides a potential solution to the SUSY flavour problem, in a highly predictive model. One undesirable feature of pure anomaly-mediation is that the slepton has a negative mass-squared. There are various ways to solve this problem, the simplest of which is the addition of a universal scalar mass at the GUT scale. The unmeasured parameters of the minimal model (mAMSB) are then $`m_{3/2}`$ – the gravitino mass; $`m_0`$ – the universal scalar mass; $`\mathrm{tan}\beta `$ – the ratio of the vacuum expectation value of the Higgs fields; and the sign of the $`\mu `$ parameter multiplying $`H_1H_2`$ in the superpotential, the magnitude of which is fixed from the condition of correct electroweak symmetry breaking.

The sparticle spectra for mAMSB have been calculated in . With pure anomaly-mediation, (i.e. $`m_0=0`$) the gaugino masses are proportional to their beta functions:

$$M_i=\frac{\beta _{g_i}}{g_i}m_{3/2}$$
(1)
where $`g_i`$ are the gauge coupling constants with $`i=1,2,3`$ indicating the gauge group, $`\beta _{g_i}`$ are their corresponding renormalisation group beta-functions, and $`m_{3/2}`$ is the gravitino mass. AMSB therefore predicts that the gaugino masses are in the approximate ratios $`M_1:M_2:M_33:1:7`$ so that the Wino (rather than the more conventional Bino) is the lightest supersymmetric particle (LSP), and the gluino is nearly an order of magnitude heavier than the LSP.

The prediction in AMSB of a Wino-like LSP has interesting phenomenological consequences. The most striking of these is that the lightest chargino is nearly mass-degenerate with the lightest neutralino. Near-degenerate particles are not unusual in SUSY phenomenology, but with AMSB one of these particles is the LSP. Since R-parity is assumed to be conserved in our analysis (unlike e.g. ) the $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+`$ may only decay into the $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0`$ so the small mass difference

$$\mathrm{\Delta }M_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1}m(\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+)m(\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0)$$
(2)
means that the lightest chargino may have a lifetime long enough to be detected at collider experiments.

In the present paper we examine the AMSB discovery potential of the LHC general-purpose detectors from several points of view. We concentrate on the ATLAS detector but similar considerations will also apply to CMS. In the next section we review the properties of the recently proposed benchmark points for minimal anomaly mediation. In sec. 3 we highlight some of the important features of the ATLAS detector. We explore the potential reach of generic SUSY search techniques in detecting minimal anomaly mediated supersymmetry in sec. 4. While the generic search reach is dependent on the mAMSB spectrum, the same is not true for the classic anomaly-mediated signature – the Wino-like LSP – which will apply beyond the minimal model. The signatures for identifying Wino-like LSPs at the LHC are explored in sec. 5. Finally in sec. 6 we examine constraints on mAMSB from measurements of the cosmological relic density, the muon anomalous magnetic moment, and the branching ratio $`BX_s\gamma `$.

## 2 Benchmark points

A set of benchmark points and ‘slopes’ or model lines was suggested for study at Snowmass. Of the eleven points, only one (SPS 9) applies to mAMSB. That point has the parameters: $`m_0=450`$ GeV, $`m_{3/2}=60`$ TeV, $`\mathrm{tan}\beta =10`$, with $`\mu >0`$, and lies on the model line “slope” $`m_0=0.0075\times m_{3/2}`$, where $`m_{3/2}`$ can vary. Part of the sparticle spectrum for SPS 9 is shown in fig. 1. The lightest sparticles — the $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0`$ — have masses about 170 GeV while squark and gluino masses are about 1.25 TeV, so one would expect copious sparticle production at the LHC. The Wino-like character of the lightest chargino and neutralino increases the relative cross-section to non-coloured sparticles as compared to e.g. SUGRA models. Indeed the HERWIG-6.3 Monte-Carlo event generator gives the inclusive SUSY cross-section as 3.9 pb, of which about 0.5 pb is to squarks and gluinos. The chain $`\stackrel{~}{q}\stackrel{~}{\chi }_2^0\stackrel{~}{l}\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0`$ is available, 111Note that SM particles are omitted from decays when this can be done without ambiguity. and has a large branching ratio, so good information about the squark, slepton, and at least two neutralino masses could be extracted from kinematic edges in the $`ll`$, $`lq`$ and $`llq`$ invariant masses.

The $`\stackrel{~}{e}_R`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{e}_L`$ masses are approximately equal (fig. 1) because in mAMSB the slepton masses are principally determined by $`m_0`$. A more detailed analysis would be required to determine if the $`\stackrel{~}{e}_R`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{e}_L`$ masses could be separately measured from two nearby edges in the $`ll`$ invariant mass distribution, as was noted in  for a similar point. The decay of the right-sleptons to the Wino-like LSP is suppressed, but not sufficiently to produce a measurable displaced vertex from slepton decay ($`\tau 10^{16}`$ s). In fact even if the Bino-like component of the LSP becomes extremely small, the decay $`\stackrel{~}{e}_R\stackrel{~}{\tau }_1\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0`$ will remain unsupressed. This is particularly true at high $`\mathrm{tan}\beta `$ since the mixing between the left- and right-handed staus increases with the tau Yukawa coupling.

Because the gluino has a similar mass to the heavier squarks at SPS 9 it decays primarily to $`\stackrel{~}{t}_1`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{b}_1`$, meaning that gluino production will lead to large numbers of $`b`$-quarks. This is not a general (or unique) feature of mAMSB, and while vertex tagging of jets could help distinguish this particular point from the SM it is not used in our analysis.

Another set of benchmarks, the ‘Points d’Aix’ chooses the mAMSB point $`m_0=1000`$ GeV, $`m_{3/2}=30`$ TeV also with $`\mu >0`$, and with the higher value $`\mathrm{tan}\beta =`$30. With a $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+`$ mass of 85 GeV, this point violates the limits from the LEP search for $`e^+e^{}\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^{}\gamma `$, which places a lower limit on the $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+`$ mass of about 92 GeV for almost all values of the mass difference $`\mathrm{\Delta }M_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1}`$.

The mAMSB Point d’Aix, despite being ruled out, still has a number of features which are of qualitative interest (fig. 2). The light gluino means that the decays $`\stackrel{~}{g}\stackrel{~}{t}\overline{t}\mathrm{and}\stackrel{~}{b}\overline{b}`$ are no longer kinematically allowed. This means that the major source of $`b`$ quarks is from $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_{2,3,4}^0\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0h`$ followed by $`hb\overline{b}`$, so fewer heavy quarks are produced than for the Snowmass point. The heavy sleptons can no longer participate in the various chains $`\stackrel{~}{q}\stackrel{~}{\chi }_x^0\stackrel{~}{l}\stackrel{~}{\chi }_y^0`$ so slepton mass measurements would be extremely difficult at a hadron collider. There will, however, be large numbers of events in which $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^\pm `$s are produced, either directly or from $`\stackrel{~}{g}\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^\pm q\overline{q}`$, so a signature based on the near-degeneracy of the $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0`$ is robust.

## 3 The ATLAS detector

ATLAS is one of two general-purpose experiments which will explore a wide variety of high $`p_T`$ physics with proton on proton collisions at $`\sqrt{s}=14`$ TeV the LHC. The LHC design luminosity is $`(10^{34}`$ $`\mathrm{cm}^2\mathrm{s}^1)`$, with a bunch-crossing period of 25 ns.

The detector design, performance and physics potential are described in . The main components are:

* An inner tracking detector contained within a 2 Tesla solenoidal field which comprises three different elements, each of which has acceptance up to $`|\eta |<2.5`$ and $`2\pi `$ in $`\varphi `$, where $`\eta =\mathrm{log}[\mathrm{tan}(\theta /2)]`$ is the pseudorapidity, $`\theta `$ is the polar angle from one of the beams, and $`\varphi `$ is the azimuth. In order of increasing radius in the transverse direction ($`r`$ in mm) the sub-detector components are: a pixel detector ($`43<r<132`$), a silicon microstrip detector ($`300<r<520`$) and a straw-tube transition radiation tracker with electron-identification ability ($`560<r<1070`$).
* A highly segmented lead/liquid-argon electromagnetic calorimeter allows electron and photon identification. The hadronic calorimeter employs steel tiles with a scintillator in the barrel region $`(|\eta |<1.7)`$ with granularity $`\mathrm{\Delta }\eta \times \mathrm{\Delta }\varphi =0.1\times 0.1`$, and copper/liquid-argon in the endcaps ($`1.5<|\eta |<3.2`$). A dense forward calorimeter with granularity $`0.2\times 0.2`$ extends coverage to $`|\eta |<5`$.
* A muon system consisting of both precision and fast (trigger) detection elements. It is constructed within a toroidal magnet system and extends to transverse radii of about 10 m.

## 4 LHC reach for mAMSB

While some of the phenomenological features are particular to AMSB, one might expect to be able to distinguish AMSB from the SM using the same types of cuts – based on leptons, jets and missing energy – that are applied in mSUGRA analyses.

The sensitivity of the LHC to mAMSB has been demonstrated for one point ($`m_0=200`$ GeV, $`m_{3/2}=35`$ TeV, $`\mathrm{tan}\beta =3`$, $`\mu >0`$) with relatively light sparticles, where the sparticle spectrum was investigated in detail. In , the signatures for AMSB at a future linear $`e^+e^{}`$ or $`e^{}\gamma `$ collider were investigated. In  the reach of the LHC was investigated using a simple generic detector simulation for 10 $`\mathrm{fb}^1`$ of integrated luminosity. The production of charged and neutral Winos via vector boson fusion was studied for AMSB in . In that paper the LHC’s reach was investigated for a signature consisting of two jets widely separated in pseudorapidity in association with missing transverse momentum.

In this section our the aim is to determine the reach of the LHC with a realistic detector simulator, using optimised but generic SUSY cuts and for 100 $`\mathrm{fb}^1`$ of integrated luminosity.

### 4.1 Event simulation

The mAMSB spectra were generated using ISAJET-7.63 on a grid 100 GeV $`\times `$ 5 TeV in the ($`m_0`$, $`m_{3/2}`$) plane. In all cases the ratio of the Higgs vacuum expectation values ($`\mathrm{tan}\beta `$) was set equal to 10 and the sign of $`\mu `$ was positive. The mass of the top quark (important for electroweak symmetry breaking) was taken to be 175 GeV throughout. The dependence of some of the key sparticle masses on the input values of $`m_0`$ and $`m_{3/2}`$ is shown in fig. 3.

In the $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^\pm \stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0`$ decays, ISAJET does not include masses for the leptons, and does not contain multi-pion decay modes. Since the mass difference $`\mathrm{\Delta }M_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1}`$ can be of the order of the mass of the muon, the lepton mass effects can be important in AMSB. To improve accuracy, the chargino decay modes calculated in  were implemented with pion form factors from  and massive leptons. The resulting chargino lifetime and branching ratios are shown in fig. 4.

HERWIG-6.3 was used to produce 200 $`\mathrm{fb}^1`$ of unweighted inclusive supersymmetry events for each point (with a minimum of $`5\times 10^4`$, and up to a maximum of $`5\times 10^5`$ events).222 No significant differences were found on comparing with HERWIG-6.4  which includes spin correlations as described in . This was then scaled to give the expected number of events for $`=100`$ $`\mathrm{fb}^1`$, which corresponds to the first year of ‘high luminosity’ $`(10^{34}`$ $`\mathrm{cm}^2\mathrm{s}^1)`$ running of the LHC. Background samples were generated with HERWIG for the production of $`W^\pm +\mathrm{jets}`$, $`Z^0+\mathrm{jets}`$, $`t\overline{t}`$, and QCD $`22`$ (excluding $`t\overline{t}`$). For the $`W^\pm +\mathrm{jets}`$ sample, the cross-sections were multiplied by the factor

$$1.6\times \left[\frac{m_W^2+(p_t^{\mathrm{thr}})^2}{m_W^2}\right]^{2(N_{\mathrm{jet}}1)}$$
(3)
where $`N_{\mathrm{jet}}`$ is the number of jets, and $`p_t^{\mathrm{thr}}`$ is the jet transverse energy threshold which was set to 10 GeV. This correction brings the HERWIG cross-section into better agreement with tree-level matrix element calculations. A total of over 20 million background events were generated in logarithmic intervals in the HERWIG parameters PTMIN and PTMAX from 0 to 7000 GeV. The background cross-sections are shown before and after preselection cuts in fig. 5.

The events were passed through the ATLAS fast detector simulator, ATLFAST-2.50, which gives a parameterised detector response based on GEANT3 Monte-Carlo simulations. Jets were found using the ATLFAST cone algorithm with a cone size $`\mathrm{\Delta }R=0.4`$, and a minimum $`p_T`$ of 10 GeV. The loss in resolution from pile-up was simulated. Calorimeter cells with $`E_T`$ deposits below 1 GeV were not included in the $`\text{ / }E_T`$ calculation in order to more accurately model the expected resolution. The cell sizes were $`\mathrm{\Delta }\eta \times \mathrm{\Delta }\varphi =0.1\times `$0.1 for $`|\eta |<3`$ and 0.2$`\times `$0.2 for $`3<|\eta |<5`$. Otherwise the default ATLFAST parameters were applied. The parameterised tracking simulation used is described in appendix B.

### 4.2 Optimisation of cuts

Cuts were applied to leptons (electrons and muons only), jets, and missing transverse energy in a similar manner to those used in . The variables to which cuts were applied were:

* $`\text{ / }E_T`$, missing transverse energy;
* $`p_{T(J1)}`$, $`p_T`$ of the hardest jet;
* $`p_{T(J2)}`$, $`p_T`$ of the next-to-hardest jet;
* $`p_T`$, scalar sum of the $`p_T`$ of jets in the event;
* $`N_{\mathrm{jet}}`$, number of jets in the event;
* $`S_\mathrm{T}`$, transverse sphericity (circularity) of the event;
* $`\mathrm{\Delta }\varphi _{(J1)}`$, difference in azimuth between hardest jet and $`\text{ / }𝐩_T`$ vector;
* $`p_{T(\mathrm{}1)}`$, $`p_T`$ of hardest lepton (if any);
* $`\mathrm{\Delta }\varphi _{(\mathrm{}1)}`$, difference in azimuth between hardest lepton (if any) and $`\text{ / }𝐩_T`$ vector;
* $`M_T=\sqrt{2p_{T(\mathrm{}1)}\text{ / }E_T(1\mathrm{cos}(\mathrm{\Delta }\varphi _{(\mathrm{}1)}))}`$, transverse mass of lepton and missing energy. Applied to single-lepton channel only, to reduce SM leptonic $`W^\pm `$ background.

The preselection cuts which were applied to cut down the background, particularly at low $`p_T`$, are shown in the third column of table 1. The reduction in the background cross-section can be seen in fig. 5. Hard preselection cuts were not placed on isolated electrons or muons since it is foreseen that one jet with $`p_T>100`$ GeV together with $`\text{ / }E_T>100`$ GeV will be sufficient to provide the on-line trigger. Other trigger strategies which would improve the reach include:

* Allowing a hard ($`20`$ GeV) isolated lepton as a trigger could improve the selection for points for relatively low $`m_0`$ in which the cascade decay $`\stackrel{~}{q}\stackrel{~}{\chi }_x^0\stackrel{~}{l}\stackrel{~}{\chi }_y^0`$ is available;
* Track vertexing which in ATLAS can be applied at the second trigger level could improve the selection for events containing heavy quarks;
* If all of the coloured sparticles are heavy then the dominant production of SUSY particles will be to the lightest gauginos. At leading order in perturbation theory, the production of $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0`$s and/or $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^\pm `$s would be difficult to trigger on, but gaugino production in association with a high $`p_T`$ jet or photon and $`\text{ / }E_T`$ might be observable.

A fraction of the simulated gaugino production events contain high $`p_T`$ jets from initial state parton showers. However the parton shower algorithm is based on the soft and co-linear approximations so this fraction will be smaller than that which would result from higher order matrix element calculations. Our simulation of the trigger can therefore be considered conservative.

Different values of the cuts were applied to events with zero, one, two or three leptons (electrons and muons only) as reconstructed by ATLFAST, as well as to an inclusive lepton (‘ptmiss’) analysis. In the case of two-lepton events, different cuts were applied according to whether the leptons were of the same sign (SS) or opposite sign (OS).

For each of these analyses the cuts were optimised in the order listed in table 1, and allowed to take one of ten values shown. The significance of the signal was given by $`S/\sqrt{B}`$ where $`S`$ and $`B`$ are the number of signal and background events expected respectively for 100 $`\mathrm{fb}^1`$. For each variable, the cut was chosen to maximise the significance subject to the constraint that $`S>10`$. The analysis was determined to be successful if significance greater than five was achieved with at least ten events passing for any set of cuts.

This technique will not necessarily generate the global maximum in $`S/\sqrt{B}`$ since the cut variables are not totally independent, but it is sufficient for the purposes of a large parameter-space scan, and it decreases the chances of over-fitting to a sparse background.

### 4.3 Results

The $`5\sigma `$ (and $`10`$ event) discovery reaches for 100 $`\mathrm{fb}^1`$ of integrated luminosity in fig. 6 and fig. 7 show that the LHC will be able to distinguish mAMSB from the SM over a large range of parameter space. As expected, the results are similar to previous generic R-parity conserving SUSY searches  with reach extending up to squark masses of about 2800 GeV, or to gluino masses of about 2100 GeV, whichever is the lower. The discovery reach is similar to, but greater than that found in  for Wino production via vector boson fusion.

In general the best reach is obtained in the single-lepton and the inclusive channel. The same-sign dilepton signal is competitive at low $`m_0`$, when $`m_\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{}}<m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_2^0}`$ – a region which includes the model line SPS G – but this sensitivity decreases as $`m_0`$ and $`m_\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{}}`$ increase. Points with large $`m_0`$ have a spectrum qualitatively similar to that in fig. 2, with heavy squarks and sleptons. Such points can still produce leptons, mostly from heavy chargino or neutralino decays. Another source of leptons is from gluino decays to higgsinos along with a quark and anti-quark from the third generation, followed by leptonic $`t`$ or $`b`$ decay.

Along the Snowmass model line ‘G’ ($`m_0=0.0075\times m_{3/2}`$) the LHC will be able to measure discrepancies from the Standard Model up to $`m_0`$=1050 GeV, $`m_{3/2}`$=140 TeV, at which point the gluino mass is 2.76 TeV and $`m_{\stackrel{~}{u}_L}=2.70`$ TeV. The Snowmass point SPS 9 lies well within the discovery region for all of the six different analyses. The optimised cuts and the resultant significance are shown in table 2 and 3. The high significance implies that it will be possible to extract further information from the data, for example to determine sparticle masses.

## 5 Distinguishing Wino-like LSPs

Most of the mass-sum rules for mAMSB involve terms like $`M_{\stackrel{~}{d}_L}^2M_{\stackrel{~}{u}_L}^2`$ which would be extremely difficult to determine experimentally. The exception is the accidental near-degeneracy of the $`\stackrel{~}{e}_L`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{e}_R`$, which might be observable at some points, as was noted in sec. 2. However points with large $`m_0`$ have relatively heavy sleptons which would have a small production cross-section at a hadron collider. The Wino-like LSP signature of AMSB, and the resultant near-degeneracy of the $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0`$ will be the robust ‘smoking gun’ for anomaly mediation, and is applicable beyond the minimal model.

The LHC, like LEP, or the Tevatron or a future linear $`e^+e^{}`$ collider can use a variety of analyses in the search for long-lived charginos, each tailored to a different regime in $`\mathrm{\Delta }M_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1}`$, according to the $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+`$ lifetime. The various regimes are ordered by decreasing $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+`$ lifetime below:

* $`\mathrm{\Delta }M_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1}<m_{\pi ^+}`$. If the pion decay mode is not available, the $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+`$ will be long lived ($`c\tau >\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}\hspace{0.17em}1}`$ m) and can leave a track through the muon chambers. Analysis of this type of signature was performed in  for a GMSB model with long-lived $`\stackrel{~}{\tau _1}`$ NLSP, and in  for an intermediate scale model with heavy stable leptons. The mass of the chargino can be measured using the muon detector as a time-of-flight system. Additional discrimination can be obtained by considering $`\frac{dE}{dx}`$ information from the transition radiation tracker. Higher-mass sparticles can then be reconstructed by forming the invariant mass of the stable particle with jets and leptons. Provided the $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+`$ lifetime, although long, is short enough that a reasonable number of $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+`$s decay within the inner detector, the mass difference $`\mathrm{\Delta }M_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1}`$ could also be determined from that fraction using the techniques described below.
* $`m_{\pi ^+}<\mathrm{\Delta }M_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1}<\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}\hspace{0.17em}200}`$ MeV. This is the regime in which high $`p_T`$ chargino tracks often decay within the body of the inner tracker to soft pions or leptons along with large amounts of missing transverse energy. The details of the detector resolution and track reconstruction algorithm are beyond the scope of this study, but such tracks should provide a striking signature provided they occur in sufficient numbers. The number of $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+`$s which would be produced at the LHC and decay within a fiducial volume in the active material of the ATLAS tracker is plotted in fig. 8 as a function of $`m_0`$ and $`m_{3/2}`$.

One-prong chargino decays such as $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0\pi ^+`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0e^+\nu _e`$ will produce ‘kinks’ at the point where the charged SM particle is softly emitted. In some cases the SM particle will go undetected and the high $`p_T`$ chargino track will seem to disappear. Such decays, producing track stubs, could also be detected with a dedicated off-line analysis.

Even though rather strict triggering requirements have been made, there are at least ten such events for 100 $`\mathrm{fb}^1`$ over almost the entire plotted parameter-space provided $`m_{3/2}<\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}\hspace{0.17em}185}`$ TeV. This signature should be essentially free of physics background, so ‘detector’ backgrounds will dominate. Since ATLAS should have three barrel pixel layers with $`r<122`$ mm with noise occupancy of less than $`10^5`$, and average physics occupancy of the order of $`10^4`$ the instrumental backgrounds should also be under control. Such a search could therefore achieve a large reach and would be sufficient to identify a near-degenerate LSP model.
* 200 MeV $`<\mathrm{\Delta }M_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1}<`$a few GeV. Chargino decays which occur before the first tracking layer can still be useful provided that the soft track from the SM particle can be found, using e.g. electron identification, track impact parameter, isolation from other tracks, and the direction of the $`\text{ / }𝐩_T`$ 2-vector.

The maximum value of $`\mathrm{\Delta }M_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1}`$ in minimal AMSB with $`\mathrm{tan}\beta =10`$ is less than about 200 MeV except close to the region of no electroweak symmetry breaking. This leads to a decay distance $`c\tau >`$ a few centimeters, and corresponds to category (2) above. However, other models such as 0-II string models have Wino-like $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0`$ with $`\mathrm{\Delta }M_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1}`$ typically of the order of a GeV. Such models fall into category (3), which is potentially the most difficult at a hadron collider because the short-lived $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+`$s will not be directly observable, and their softly emitted SM daughters suffer from a large background from other low-momentum tracks. In sec. 5.1 we define a range of model points which allows us to study this regime of shorter lifetimes. Some of the methods which can enable the LHC to probe this region are explored in sec. 5.2.

### 5.1 Definition of points

The tree-level neutralino mass matrix is:

$$\left(\begin{array}{cccc}M_1& 0& m_Zc_\beta s_W& m_Zs_\beta s_W\\ 0& M_2& m_Zc_\beta c_W& m_Zs_\beta c_W\\ m_Zc_\beta s_W& m_Zc_\beta c_W& 0& \mu \\ m_Zs_\beta s_W& m_Zs_\beta c_W& \mu & 0\end{array}\right)$$
(4)
and the tree-level chargino mass matrix is:

$$\left(\begin{array}{cc}M_2& \sqrt{2}m_Ws_\beta \\ \sqrt{2}m_Wc_\beta & \mu \end{array}\right),$$
(5)
where $`s_W\mathrm{sin}\theta _W`$, $`c_W\mathrm{cos}\theta _W`$, $`s_\beta \mathrm{sin}\beta `$, $`c_\beta \mathrm{cos}\beta `$ and we use the conventions of . The mass difference $`m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+}m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+}\mathrm{\Delta }M_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1}`$ is highly suppressed at tree-level, so the leading 1-loop correction can be important. It takes the form:

$$\mathrm{\Delta }M_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1}^{}{}_{}{}^{(1\mathrm{loop})}=\frac{\alpha _2M_2}{4\pi }\left[F\left(\frac{m_W}{M_2}\right)c_W^2F\left(\frac{m_Z}{M_2}\right)+5s_W^2\right],$$
(6)
where $`F(a)_0^1𝑑x(2+2x)\mathrm{log}[x^2+(1x)a^2]`$, and is included in ISAJET.

We are interested in the collider phenomenology of long-lived charginos with various lifetimes. From (LABEL:AMSB:NTLMATRIX) and (5), the leading tree-level mass difference term $`\mathrm{\Delta }M_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1}1/\mu ^2`$. In order to explore different regimes in $`\mathrm{\Delta }M_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1}`$, we define new points based on SPS 9 and another minimal anomaly-mediated point with $`m_0=500`$ GeV, $`m_{3/2}=36`$ TeV, $`\mu >0`$ and $`\mathrm{tan}\beta =10`$. We then decreased the value of the $`\mu `$ parameter at the electroweak scale to the values shown in table 4.

In order to maintain consistent electroweak symmetry breaking when decreasing $`\mu `$, the Higgs soft mass parameters, $`m_{H_1}^2`$ and $`m_{H_2}^2`$, must allowed to vary, as can be seen from tree-level equation,

$$\mu ^2=\frac{m_{H_1}^2m_{H_2}^2\mathrm{tan}^2\beta }{\mathrm{tan}^2\beta 1}\frac{1}{2}m_Z^2.$$

The points with adjusted $`\mu `$ are then no longer in the minimal anomaly-mediated scenario, since $`m_{H_1}^2`$ and $`m_{H_2}^2`$ are not those which would be predicted from the mAMSB parameters $`m_0`$ and $`m_{3/2}`$. Decreasing $`\mu `$ has the side-effect of decreasing the masses of the higgsinos, and can change the phenomenology somewhat – for example by opening chains such as $`\stackrel{~}{q}\stackrel{~}{\chi }_2^+q\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+qZ^0`$. When followed by leptonic $`Z^0`$ decay these chains could, in principle, be used to further constrain the dynamics. However the only requirement we make for our analysis is that the decay $`\stackrel{~}{q}\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+q`$ occurs, producing highly boosted $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^\pm `$ pairs in association with jets.

### 5.2 Identifying chargino decay products

In this section we demonstrate how the low-$`p_T`$ tracks from the charged SM daughters of $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+`$ decays can be identified and used to constrain $`\mathrm{\Delta }M_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1}`$. To do so we must distinguish these tracks from the large number of other low-$`p_T`$ tracks from the particles generated in the proton remnant interactions, and from any pile-up events. To avoid having to deal with the contamination from multiple pile-up, in this section we simulate the initial three years of ‘low luminosity’ $`(10^{34}`$ $`\mathrm{cm}^2\mathrm{s}^1)`$ running of the LHC, which is expected to provide 30 $`\mathrm{fb}^1`$ of integrated luminosity with an average of one inelastic collision per bunch-crossing. The loss of resolution from pile-up is therefore not simulated in this section.

The HERWIG soft underlying event model, based on the UA5 collaboration $`p\overline{p}`$ Monte-Carlo, is known to underestimate the number of tracks with $`p_T>1`$ GeV, because it does not model the semi-hard physics of multiple parton interactions. To ensure that our analysis was insensitive to contamination from such tracks, a sample of 5000 inclusive QCD events with $`\mathrm{𝙿𝚃𝙼𝙸𝙽}=4.5`$ GeV was generated. We refer to these as ‘minimum bias events’ because they simulate (better than the default HERWIG soft minimum bias option) the expected minimum bias distribution of tracks, including a tail at higher $`p_T`$ due to the onset of hard scattering. The particles from this minimum bias event were added to the SUSY event in addition to HERWIG’s usual underlying event.

An initial selection requiring a high $`p_T`$ jet and large missing transverse energy was made to trigger the event, reduce the SM background, and select those SUSY events in which the neutralino was highly boosted. In this section we are dealing with the short-lifetime regime ($`c\tau <1`$ mm), so this boost will almost certainly not be sufficient to allow the chargino to live long enough to decay in the body of the detector. However a boosted chargino means that even particles which are very softly emitted in the chargino rest frame will have a transverse momentum

$$p_{Tx}\frac{p_{T\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}}{m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}}\times m_x$$

as measured in the detector, where $`x`$ is the charged SM daughter particle and $`p_{T\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}`$ is of the order of the missing transverse momentum. This extra $`p_T`$ assists the reconstruction of the SM daughters of charginos and helps distinguish them from even softer particles coming from the underlying event (fig. 9).

The tracks from SM daughters of chargino decays have other properties which can help in their identification. For larger $`\mathrm{\Delta }M_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1}`$ the $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+`$ branching ratio to each of muon or electron and associated neutrino can be up to nearly twenty percent (fig. 4b). In the ATLAS experiment electrons and muons will be distinguished from other tracks by transistion radiation and by penetration respectively (see appendix B).

Much of the background is associated with heavy-quark decay and can be removed by applying isolation cuts (table 5) which require that for any track, $`i`$, to be a candidate:

* no other track is found with $`\mathrm{\Delta }R_{ij}=\sqrt{(\mathrm{\Delta }\eta _{ij})^2+(\mathrm{\Delta }\varphi _{ij})^2}`$ less than some value $`\mathrm{\Delta }R_{ij}^{\mathrm{min}}`$;
* the invariant mass of the track with another track, $`j`$, is greater than $`M_{ij}^{\mathrm{min}}`$ for all $`j`$, where it is assumed that $`m_i=m_j=m_{\pi ^+}`$;
* no other track with $`R_{ij}<R_{\mathrm{imp}}`$ has $`d_0^{(j)}/\sigma (d_0^{(j)})>3`$, where $`d_0^{(j)}`$ is the transverse impact parameter, and $`\sigma (d_0^{(j)})`$ is its uncertainty;
* $`_jd_0^{(j)}/\sigma (d_0^{(j)})<\sigma _{\mathrm{imp}}`$ where the sum is over all $`ji`$ with $`R_{ij}<R_{\mathrm{imp}}`$.

### 5.3 Results

We selected those events in which precisely two tracks satisfied the track cuts listed in table 5. The numbers of tracks from chargino decays and from other sources which passed subsequent cuts are shown in fig. 10 for the point SPS-250. We then considered the Cambridge $`m_{TX}`$ variable which (as described in appendix A) remains sensitive to $`\mathrm{\Delta }M_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1}`$ even when there are uncertainties in the neutralino mass or the missing transverse momentum, providing an important handle on Wino-LSP physics at hadron colliders. We assume that both the squark mass scale, $`m_{\stackrel{~}{q}}`$, and the $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0`$ mass have been previously determined from the measurement of other kinematic edges as described in , and plot distributions of $`m_{TX}m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}`$ which has the property:

$$0<(m_{TX}m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0})(m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+}m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0})\mathrm{\Delta }M_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1}.$$
(7)
For the two points with $`\mathrm{\Delta }M_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1}1.7`$ GeV, we selected isolated leptons and plotted distributions of $`m_{T4}m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}`$. As can be seen in fig. 11, A-200 has more signal events passing the cuts than SPS-250, but the peak position is the same in both cases.

As $`\mathrm{\Delta }M_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1}`$ decreases, the leptonic branching ratios decrease (see fig. 4b) and the detector’s ability to distinguish the lower $`p_T`$ leptons from hadrons is diminished (see appendix B). For this reason, at the two points with $`\mathrm{\Delta }M_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1}800`$ MeV we select events with two tracks of any type satisfying the cuts in the third column of table 5. Most of these tracks will be pions because of the large branching ratio to $`\pi ^\pm `$ or $`\pi ^\pm \pi ^0`$. The $`m_{T2}m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}`$ distributions for these two points are plotted in fig. 12.

For all four points the narrow peaks indicate that $`\mathrm{\Delta }M_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1}`$ is of the order of 1 GeV. This confirms the Wino-like nature of the LSP, providing the ‘smoking gun’ signature for anomaly mediation.

Each $`m_{TX}`$ distribution depends principally on $`\mathrm{\Delta }M_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1}`$, on the neutralino mass and the momentum distribution of the charginos. The latter depends largely on $`m_{\stackrel{~}{q}}`$ so if both $`m_{\stackrel{~}{q}}`$ and the lightest neutralino mass were already measured, then $`\mathrm{\Delta }M_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1}`$ can be measured by fitting to each $`m_{TX}m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}`$ distribution.

To demonstrate that $`m_{T4}`$ can indeed make a quantitative measurement of $`\mathrm{\Delta }M_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1}`$, a phase-space Monte-Carlo program was used to generate very simple ‘events’ in which pairs of squarks decayed via the chain $`\stackrel{~}{q}\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+q\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0e\nu _eq`$. $`m_{T4}m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}`$ distributions were produced for those events in which $`\text{ / }p_T>500`$ GeV, and the peak determined from a gaussian fit. The correlation between the fitted peak positions and the input values of $`\mathrm{\Delta }M_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1}`$ is shown in fig. 13. The peak of the $`m_{T4}m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}`$ distribution for point A-200 (fig. 11b), was likewise determined from a gaussian fit. As can be seen from fig. 13 the mass difference $`\mathrm{\Delta }M_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1}`$ can be measured at that point with a statistical uncertainty of approximately 150 MeV (10%).

## 6 Other constraints

### 6.1 Cosmological relic density

If R-Parity is conserved then the lightest supersymmetric particle can be a good candidate for the cold (non-relativistic) dark matter hypothesised by astrophysicists and cosmologists. The cold dark matter contribution to critical density of the universe provided by the LSP is given by:

$$\omega _{\mathrm{CDM}}\mathrm{\Omega }_{\mathrm{CDM}}h^2=\frac{m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}n_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}}{\rho _{\mathrm{crit}}/h^2}$$

where $`\rho _{\mathrm{crit}}=3H^2/8\pi G`$ is the critical density, $`n_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}`$ is the number density of LSPs, and $`H=h\times 100`$ km $`\mathrm{s}^1\mathrm{Mpc}^1`$ is the Hubble constant.

Astronomical estimates from measurements of the acoustic power spectrum of the cosmic microwave background anisotropy suggest that $`\omega _{\mathrm{CDM}}=0.106\pm 0.010`$. Further constraints from the 2dF Galactic Redshift Survey lead to $`\omega _{\mathrm{CDM}}=0.1151\pm 0.0091`$, assuming a flat universe $`(\mathrm{\Sigma }_i\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{i}=1)`$.

In AMSB the Wino-like $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+`$ undergo rapid annihilation though reactions such as $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0W^+W^{}`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+qq^{}`$. The relic density of cold dark matter was calculated for AMSB using the program micrOmegas, which includes the annihilation channels listed in table 6. The results, in fig. 14, show that the value of $`\omega _{\mathrm{CDM}}`$ is small throughout the region, and about a factor of two less than was estimated in :

$$\omega _{\mathrm{CDM}}^{\mathrm{no}\mathrm{coanh}}5\times 10^4\times \left(\frac{m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}}{100\mathrm{GeV}}\right),$$

which neglected the co-annihilation channels.

Thus in AMSB the LSP does not give any problems with relic overabundance, but suffers the opposite problem – that sparticles in thermal equilibrium in the early universe will not produce sufficient neutralino dark matter. It has been suggested in  that decays of cosmological moduli – which are low mass particles predicted by string theory when supersymmetry is broken – could have produced Winos with sufficient abundance to be of astrophysical interest.

### 6.2 Muon $`g2`$

It is well know that the gyromagnetic moment of the muon, $`g_\mu `$ can sensitive to sparticle interactions through loop corrections. The recent BNL measurements dominate the world experimental average of the positive muon anomalous moment,

$$a_\mu ^{\mathrm{BNL}}=(g_\mu 2)/2=11659203(8)\times 10^{10}.$$

Standard Model calculations of $`a_\mu `$ have been reviewed in . Recent calculations , which include a correction to the sign of the pion pole part of the hadronic light-by-light contribution, were combined in  to give:

$$11659177(7)\times 10^{10}a_\mu ^{\mathrm{SM}}11659186(8)\times 10^{10}.$$

The SUSY contribution is typically dominated by loops involving charginos and neutralinos, and is proportional to $`\mathrm{tan}\beta `$ in the high $`\mathrm{tan}\beta `$ limit. The AMSB contributions to $`a_\mu `$ have been calculated in . In fig. 15 we plot the $`a_\mu ^{\mathrm{AMSB}}`$ for $`\mathrm{tan}\beta =10`$ and 30, where again we have made use of the program micrOmegas.333Note that ISASUSY produces AMSB points with negative $`M_1`$ and $`M_2`$ so the sign correlation between $`\mu `$ and $`a_\mu ^{\mathrm{SUSY}}`$ is opposite to that in . The AMSB contribution is small compared to both the experimental and theoretical uncertainties, except at small $`m_0`$$`m_{3/2}`$.

### 6.3 $`BX_s\gamma `$

The inclusive radiative decay $`BX_s\gamma `$ is sensitive to sparticle properties through radiative corrections involving charged higgs, chargino and $`\stackrel{~}{t}`$ loops (see for example ).

Experimental measurements of the branching ratio from the CLEO, BELLE and BaBar collaborations give:

$`(BX_s\gamma )^{\mathrm{CLEO}}`$ $`=`$ $`3.21\pm 0.43\pm 0.27_{0.10}^{+0.18}\times 10^4`$
$`(BX_s\gamma )^{\mathrm{BELLE}}`$ $`=`$ $`3.39\pm 0.53\pm 0.42_{0.55}^{+0.51}\times 10^4,`$
$`(BX_s\gamma )^{\mathrm{BaBar}}`$ $`=`$ $`3.88\pm 0.36\pm 0.37_{0.23}^{+0.43}\times 10^4,`$
where the errors are statistical, systematic, and from theory respectively. Renormalisation scale uncertainties  lead to a 10% ($`\pm 0.3\times 10^4`$) uncertainty in the SM prediction. The mAMSB contributions were calculated using micrOmegas and are plotted in fig. 16. The combined experimental and theoretical uncertainty does not allow us to constrain the mAMSB parameter space at better than $`2\sigma `$ for either of $`\mathrm{tan}\beta =10,30`$.

The overall effect of the $`BX_s\gamma `$ and to a greater extent the $`g_\mu 2`$ constraint is to disfavour the low $`m_0`$, $`m_{3/2}`$ region especially when $`\mathrm{tan}\beta `$ is large.

## 7 Conclusions

If anomaly mediated supersymmetry is present at the 1 to 2 TeV scale, the LHC will observe excesses in various multi-lepton + $`\text{ / }E_T`$ channels. We have used generic supersymmetry search procedures, and a realistic detector simulation, to investigate the ability of the experiments at the LHC to discover AMSB scenarios. By selecting events with very large missing energy and identifying tracks from chargino decays, the Wino-like nature of the LSP can be determined, and $`m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+}m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}`$ can be measured over a large range in parameter space. Careful study of the tracks left by $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^\pm `$s and their decay products can give clear evidence for this class of models even in cases where the chargino is shorter-lived than predicted in minimal AMSB.

###### Acknowledgments.

The authors would like to thank Bryan Webber and Phil Stephens for providing constructive comments. We are indebted to Carolina Ödman and Phil Marshall of the Cavendish Astrophysics group who provided many of the references in sec. 6. We have made use of the ATLAS physics analysis framework and tools which are the result of collaboration-wide efforts. This work was partly funded by the UK Particle Physics and Astronomy Research Council.

## Appendix A The variable $`m_{T2}`$ and its generalisation

The Cambridge $`m_{T2}`$ variable, proposed in , can be used in analyses such as , where particles are pair-produced at hadronic colliders, and decay semi-invisibly, as is the case in R-parity conserving SUSY. This variable is used in symmetrical, two-body decays of supersymmetric particles, where the LSP is unobserved, and so must be inferred from missing energy.

### A.1 The properties of $`m_{T2}`$

For events in which the decay of a heavy object produces an unseen particle, such as

$$\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0\pi ^+$$
(9)
one can write the Lorentz invariant

$$m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+}^2=m_\pi ^2+m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}^2+2\left[E_T^\pi E_T^{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}\mathrm{cosh}(\mathrm{\Delta }\eta )𝐩_T^\pi 𝐩_T^{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}\right]$$
(10)
where $`𝐩_T^\pi `$ and $`𝐩_T^{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}`$ indicate pion and neutralino 2-vectors in the transverse plane, and the transverse energies are defined by

$$E_T^\pi =\sqrt{(𝐩_T^\pi ){}_{}{}^{2}+m_\pi ^2}\text{ and }E_T^{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}=\sqrt{(𝐩_T^{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}){}_{}{}^{2}+m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}^2}.$$
(11)
Also

$$\eta =\frac{1}{2}\mathrm{log}\left[\frac{E+p_z}{Ep_z}\right]$$
(12)
is the true rapidity, so that

$$\mathrm{tanh}\eta =p_z/E,\mathrm{sinh}\eta =p_z/E_T,\mathrm{cosh}\eta =E/E_T.$$
(13)
In a hadron collider, only the transverse components of a missing particle’s momentum can be inferred, so it is useful to define the transverse mass,

$$m_T^2(𝐩_T^\pi ,𝐩_T^{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0})m_{\pi ^+}^2+m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}^2+2(E_T^\pi E_T^{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}𝐩_T^\pi 𝐩_T^{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0})$$
(14)
which, because $`\mathrm{cosh}(x)1`$, is less than or equal to the mass of the lightest chargino, with equality only when the rapidity difference between the neutralino and the pion, $`\mathrm{\Delta }\eta _{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0\pi }`$ is zero. All other $`\mathrm{\Delta }\eta `$ lead to $`m_T<m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+}`$, so if we knew the neutralino momentum we could use $`m_T`$ to give an event by event lower bound on the lightest chargino mass. $`m_T`$ was used in this way by UA1  in the measurement of the $`W^\pm `$ mass.

In R-parity conserving SUSY events there are expected to be two unseen LSPs.444Though there may also be other unseen particles – see appendix A.2. Since only the sum of the missing transverse momentum of the two neutralinos is known, the variable

$`m_{T2}^2`$ $``$ $`\underset{\text{ / }𝐪_T^{(1)}+\text{ / }𝐪_T^{(2)}=\text{ / }𝐩_T}{\mathrm{min}}\left[\mathrm{max}\{m_T^2(𝐩_T^{\pi ^{(1)}},\text{ / }𝐪_T^{(1)}),m_T^2(𝐩_T^{\pi ^{(2)}},\text{ / }𝐪_T^{(2)})\}\right]`$ (15)
is a lower bound on the transverse mass $`m_T`$ for events where two decays of the type (9) occur. In (15) we have been forced to minimise over all consistent neutralino 2-momenta. Note that $`\text{ / }𝐪_T^{(i)}`$ is the hypothesised momentum of the $`i`$th neutralino which need not be equal to its true momentum.

To find the range of values $`m_{T2}`$ may take we first let $`f_1=m_T^2(𝐩_T^{\pi ^{(1)}},\text{ / }𝐪_T^{(1)})`$, and $`f_2=m_T^2(𝐩_T^{\pi ^{(2)}},\text{ / }𝐪_T^{(2)})`$. We then note that the minimum over a parameter $`x`$ of the maximum of $`f_1(x)`$ and $`f_2(x)`$ can occur at a local minimum, $`f_{1(2)}^{}(x^{})=0`$, provided $`f_{1(2)}(x^{})>f_{2(1)}(x^{})`$, as shown in fig. 17a. Alternatively the minimum can occur when the functions cross one another when $`f_1=f_2`$ (fig. 17b) or at a boundary (fig. 17c). The parameter $`x`$ corresponds to the fraction of the the missing momentum (in one of the transverse directions) which is assigned to each half of the event. Since $`f_1,f_2\mathrm{}`$ as $`x\pm \mathrm{}`$ fig. 17c is not relevant to our minimisation problem.

To see that case (a) cannot occur, consider the unconstrained minimisation over $`\text{ / }𝐪_T`$, of $`m_T^2(𝐩_T^\pi ,\text{ / }𝐪_T)`$. Using the relationship

$$\frac{\text{ / }E_T}{\text{ }q\text{ }/_k}=\frac{\text{ }q\text{ }/_k}{\text{ / }E_T},$$
(16)
where $`\text{ / }E_T^2=\text{ / }𝐪_T^2+m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}^2`$, it is straightforward to show that,

$$\frac{m_T^2}{\text{ }q\text{ }/_k}=2\left(E_T^\pi \frac{\text{ }q\text{ }/_k}{\text{ / }E_T}p_k^\pi \right)k=1,2.$$
(17)
This means that at the minimum

$$𝐯_T^\pi =\text{ / }𝐮_T,$$
(18)
where we introduce the notation $`𝐯_T𝐩_T/E_T`$, $`\text{ / }𝐮_T\text{ / }𝐪_T/\text{ / }E_T`$. where $`𝐩_T`$ and $`𝐯_T`$ represent the true transverse momentum and velocity of a particle, while $`\text{ / }𝐪_T`$ and $`\text{ / }𝐮_T`$ are assigned by the minimisation.

Using the basis ($`t`$$`x`$$`y`$) with the metric diag(1,-1,-1), one can write

$$m_T^2=(E_T^{\mathrm{tot}},𝐩_T^{\mathrm{tot}})(E_T^{\mathrm{tot}},𝐩_T^{\mathrm{tot}}),$$
(19)
where $`E_T^{\mathrm{tot}}=E_T^\pi +\text{ / }E_T`$ and $`𝐩_T^{\mathrm{tot}}=𝐩_T^\pi +\text{ / }𝐪_T`$. This 1+2 dimensional Lorentz invariant can be evaluated in any frame boosted from the lab in the transverse plane. (18) has told us that at the unconstrained minimum the transverse velocities $`𝐯_T^\pi `$ and $`\text{ / }𝐮_T`$ are equal; a statement necessarily true in all transverse frames, including the special one in which both the transverse velocities (and associated momenta) are zero. Evaluating (19) in this frame, we find that the unconstrained minimum of (19) then becomes $`(m_\pi +m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0},0,0)(m_\pi +m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0},0,0)`$, and we recover the expected result

$$m_T^{\mathrm{min}}=m_\pi +m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}.$$
(20)
We therefore conclude that the function $`m_T^2`$ has only one stationary value and it is the global minimum, and is common to both sides of the event provided the same type of particles are emitted. Thus when $`f_1`$ is minimum it cannot be greater than $`f_2`$, and so the minimisation in (15) forces $`f_1=f_2`$. This could of course occur when both $`f_1`$ and $`f_2`$ are at their global minima, in which case $`m_{T2}`$ takes its minimum value:

$$m_{T2}^{}{}_{}{}^{\mathrm{min}}=m_\pi +m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}.$$
(21)
To summarise, $`m_{T2}`$ is the minimum of $`m_T^{(1)}`$ subject to the two constraints $`m_T^{(1)}=m_T^{(2)}`$, and $`\text{ / }𝐩_T^{(1)}+\text{ / }𝐩_T^{(2)}=\text{ / }𝐩_T`$. The condition for the minimisation can be calculated by Lagrange multiplier methods, the result of which is that the velocity vectors $`\text{ / }𝐮_T^{(1,2)}`$ of the assigned neutralino momenta $`\text{ / }𝐪_T^{(1,2)}`$ must satisfy

$$(\text{ / }𝐮_T^{(1)}𝐯_T^{\pi ^{(1)}})(\text{ / }𝐮_T^{(2)}𝐯_T^{\pi ^{(2)}}).$$
(22)
To find the maximum of $`m_{T2}`$ over many events we note that for each event the minimisation will select hypothesised momenta satisfying (22). We now note events can occur in which the true transverse velocities of the neutralinos were exactly those which were assigned by the minimisation, i.e. they can satisfy

$$𝐯_T^{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0(1)}=\text{ / }𝐮_T^{(1)},𝐯_T^{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0(2)}=\text{ / }𝐮_T^{(2)}.$$
(23)
These events will have both hypothesised transverse masses equal not only to each other but also to true transverse masses which would have been calculated if the neutralino momenta had been known:

$$m_T^{(i)}(𝐩_T^{\pi ^{(i)}},\text{ / }𝐩_T^{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0(i)})=m_T^{(i)}(𝐩_T^{\pi ^{(i)}},\text{ / }𝐪_T^{(i)})$$
(24)
If events occur where, in addition to the transverse components of the neutralino momenta satisfying (23), the rapidity differences satisfy $`\eta _{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0(1)}=\eta _{\pi (1)}`$ and $`\eta _{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0(2)}=\eta _{\pi (2)}`$, then by (10) $`m_{T2}`$ will equal the true mass of the chargino. Combining this with (21) and recalling that $`m_{T2}`$ cannot be greater than the chargino mass by construction, we can see that the event-by event distribution of $`m_{T2}`$ can span the range

$$m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}+m_\pi m_{T2}m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+}$$
(25)
showing that $`m_{T2}`$ is sensitive to the $`m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+}m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}\mathrm{\Delta }M_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1}`$ mass difference.

The variable is equally applicable to two same-sign $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+`$ decays so $`m_{T2}`$ signal events can be defined as those having two $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^\pm \stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0\pi ^\pm `$ decays with any combination of charges.

### A.2 Generalisations of $`m_{T2}`$

In our analysis we also wish to make use of the leptonic decays $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0\mathrm{}\nu _{\mathrm{}}`$ where $`\mathrm{}e,\mu `$. We therefore generalise $`m_{T2}`$ to cases where more than two particles go undetected.

Consider events in which a chargino is produced and then decays to $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0e\nu _e`$. If we expand the Lorentz invariant

$$(m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+})^2=(p_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}+p_e+p_\nu )^2$$
(26)
we obtain three mass-squared terms for each of the decay particles and three cross-terms. The cross-terms can each be written in the form

$$p_ap_b=E_T^{(a)}E_T^{(b)}\mathrm{cosh}(\mathrm{\Delta }\eta _{ab})𝐩_T^{(a)}𝐩_T^{(b)}.$$
(27)
If the neutralino and neutrino transverse momenta were individually known we could evaluate the transverse mass,

$$m_T^2=m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}^2+m_e^2+2\left[(E_T^eE_T^\chi 𝐩_T^e𝐩_T^\chi )+(E_T^\nu E_T^\chi 𝐩_T^\nu 𝐩_T^\chi )+(E_T^eE_T^\nu 𝐩_T^e𝐩_T^\nu )\right],$$
(28)
where the neutrino mass is assumed to be negligible. $`m_T`$ will be equal to the $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+`$ mass in events where $`\mathrm{\Delta }\eta _{ab}=0`$ for all pairs of $`e`$, $`\nu _e`$, and $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0`$.

In events with two leptonic chargino decays a variable like $`m_{T2}`$ can be defined as in (15) but using the three-particle definition of $`m_T`$ from (28) and with the modified constraint,

$$𝐪_T^{\nu (1)}+𝐪_T^{\chi (1)}+𝐪_T^{\nu (2)}+𝐪_T^{\chi (2)}=\text{ / }𝐩_T,$$
(29)
where the labels (1) and (2) indicate which chargino the particles were emitted from. We call this variable $`m_{T4}`$ (or indeed $`m_{TX}`$ where $`X`$ is the number of undetected particles).

The conditions for the minimisation required to calculate $`m_{T4}`$ can be calculated just as for $`m_{T2}`$. The Euler-Lagrange equations involving

$$\frac{(m_T^{(i)})^2}{𝐪_T^{\nu (i)}}\mathrm{and}\frac{(m_T^{(i)})^2}{𝐪_T^{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0(i)}}$$

show that the minimisation will select the invisible particles’ momenta such that $`𝐮_T^{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0(i)}=𝐮_T^{\nu (i)}`$. The other E-L equations reproduce (22) but with electrons replacing pions.

This means that when calculating $`m_{T4}`$ one can replace the missing particles from each chargino decay with a pseudo-particle with mass equal to the sum of the masses of those invisible particles and proceed as for $`m_{T2}`$. In the case of leptonic chargino decay the mass of the neutrino can be safely neglected in comparison to that of the $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0`$, and the constraint $`𝐮_T^{\chi (i)}=𝐮_T^{\nu (i)}`$ is equivalent to $`𝐪_T^{\nu (i)}=(0,0)`$.

The generalisation to $`m_{TX}`$ for other values of $`X`$ is straightforward. The distribution of $`m_{T3}`$ is shown in fig. 18a for events in which one chargino decays to $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0,e,\nu `$ and another to $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0,\pi ^+`$. Unlike $`m_{T2}`$ and $`m_{T4}`$ it has a sharp peak at $`m_{T3}=m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}+m_\pi `$. This occurs because the visible particles on each side of the event are different and so the unconstrained minimum of the values of $`m_T`$ on each side of the event are not equal as they are in the case of $`m_{T2}`$ and $`m_{T4}`$:

$$\underset{\text{ / }𝐪_𝐓^{(\mathrm{𝟏})}}{\mathrm{min}}\left(m_T^{(1)}(𝐩_T^\pi ,\text{ / }𝐪_T^{(1)})\right)=m_\pi +m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}m_e+m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}=\underset{\text{ / }𝐪_𝐓^{(\mathrm{𝟐})}}{\mathrm{min}}\left(m_T^{(2)}(𝐩_T^e,\text{ / }𝐪_T^{(2)})\right)$$
(30)
Some of the events can then fall into the category shown in fig. 17a, producing a peak of events with $`m_T=m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}+m_\pi `$.

The distribution over events of $`m_{T4}`$ will have fewer entries near the upper kinematic limit ($`m_{T4}=m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^+}`$) because when more particles go undetected an event at that limit must satisfy a larger number of constraints. For fully leptonic chargino decay, there are six constraints of the type $`\mathrm{\Delta }\eta =0`$, two $`𝐩_T^{\nu (i)}=0`$ and finally the modified constraint from (22). This effect can be seen in fig. 18a for events where a total of two, three and four invisible particles are produced.

A further generalisation which we do not require here might be relevant in cases where more than one visible particle is emitted from each mother. For such decays, one would sum the full 4-momenta of the visible particles from each decay as well as summing the masses of the invisible particles from each side of the event and proceed as for $`m_{T2}`$.

### A.3 Uncertainties in $`\text{ / }𝐩_T`$ and $`m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}`$

The sensitivity of $`m_{TX}`$ to the estimated mass of the neutralino is shown in fig. 18b, where 10% (16 GeV) errors in $`\chi `$ result in similar fractional errors in $`\mathrm{\Delta }M_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1}`$ i.e. of a few tens of MeV. $`m_{TX}`$ shows similar insensitivity to measurement uncertainties in the missing transverse momentum vector. This behaviour can be (at least partially) understood from the non-relativistic limit of $`m_{T2}`$, when the proportionality in (22) becomes an equality and

$$m_{T2}^{}{}_{}{}^{2}(m_\pi +m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0})^2=\frac{1}{4m_\pi m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}}\left(m_\pi \text{ / }𝐩_Tm_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}𝐩_T^{\pi _1}m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}𝐩_T^{\pi _2}\right)^2+𝒪\left((𝐯_T𝐯_T)^2\right).$$
(31)
One can see that in (31) $`m_\pi `$ multiplies the missing momentum, while $`m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}`$ multiplies the pion transverse momenta.

## Appendix B Simulation of particle tracks

Part of the ATLFAST  software provides fast parameterised simulation of the ATLAS inner detector performance. In particular it calculates the expected track reconstruction efficiency, and smears the five track helix parameters and according to particle type. The parameterisation used was based on GEANT3 Monte-Carlo simulations using a Kalman-filter algorithm for track reconstruction. A parameterisation from a large statistics Monte-Carlo sample, was used for the hadronic track smearing for this study.

### B.1 Low $`p_T`$ electron identification

In ATLAS the transition radiation tracker allows the identification of low-energy electrons because they emit more transition radiation than more massive particles with the same momentum. The issue of particle misidentification is not dealt with in the standard version of ATLFAST, and so has been implemented independently in our analysis.

Test beam performance was compared to Monte-Carlo simulations in  using a combined discriminator which considered both the number of high threshold clusters and the time for which the charge deposited exceeded a lower threshold. In that paper the pion misidentification probability was calculated as a function of transverse momentum at $`\eta =0.3`$ for an electron efficiency of 90% (table 7). For our simulation these efficiencies were extrapolated to other values of $`\eta `$ by comparison with the GEANT3 simulations performed in . The $`p_T`$ and $`\eta `$ dependent correction factors are shown in table 8.

### B.2 Low $`p_T`$ muon identification

High energy muons are easily identified because of their high penetration. Identification efficiency is drastically reduced when muons have an insufficient transverse momentum to extend their track helix into the dedicated muon detectors. The applied identification efficiencies for muons were based on  and are shown in table 9.


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# References

Effect of Earth’s rotation on the trajectories of free-fall bodies in Equivalence Principle Experiment

C. G. Shaoa, Y. Z. Zhangb,c, J. Luoa and Z. Z. Liua

aDepartment of Physics, Huazhong University of Science and Technology,
Wuhan 430074, China
bCCAST(World Lab.), P. O. Box 8730, Beijing 100080, China
cInstitute of Theoretical Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, P.O. Box 2735,
Beijing 100080, China

## Abstract

Owing to Earth’s rotation a free-fall body would move in an elliptical orbit rather than along a straight line forward to the center of the Earth. In this paper on the basis of the theory for spin-spin coupling between macroscopic rotating bodies we study violation of the equivalence principle from long-distance free-fall experiments by means of a rotating ball and a non-rotating sell. For the free-fall time of 40 seconds, the difference between the orbits of the two free-fall bodies is of the order of $`10^9`$cm which could be detected by a SQUID magnetometer owing to such a magnetometer can be used to measure displacements as small as $`10^{13}`$ centimeters.

PACS number(s): 04.80.Cc

As one of the fundamental hypotheses of Einstein’s general relativity, the equivalence principle (EP) has been tested by many experiments \[1–7\]. Some different tests of EP for gravitational self-energy  and spin-polarized macroscopic objects  have been also reported. However, in all of the experiments as well as the Satellite Test of the Equivalence Principle (STEP), the Galileo Galilei (GG) space projects and the MICROSCOPE space mission \[11–13\], it is non-rotating bodies that are used. Recently, a theory of EP violation coming from the spin-spin coupling between rotating macroscopic bodies was developed  and preliminary experiments have been performed \[16–18\].

In order to test with higher precision the possible violation of the EP coming from the spin-spin coupling of rotating macroscopic bodies, some proposed long-distance free-fall experiments by using a drop tower of one hundred meter high or a drop capsule of 40 kilometer altitude have been suggested . In this type of experiments the drop test masses may be a superconducting gyroscope consisting of an inner spinning superconducting ball and an outer non-rotating shell, and the gap between the inner ball and outer shell could be measured by means of a superconducting quantum interference device (SQUID). The superconducting gyro is suspended on the top of a vacuum capsule. Cutting off the suspension wire and, at the same time, turning off the power supply of the gyro when the vacuum capsule starts in free-fall, both the inner spinning ball and the outer non-rotating shell would then move freely in the vacuum capsule. If the Earth did not rotate, the gyro would simply fall forward to the center of the Earth. In this case, any relative shift between the inner ball and the outer shell would arise only in the free-fall direction rather than the horizontal one if the EP violates. However, owing to the nonzero initial velocity of the gyro associated with Earth’s rotation the real trajectory of the gyro would be an elliptical orbit rather than a straight line perpendicular to Earth’s surface. The expected relative displacements between the inner ball and the outer shell would then occur in both the vertical and horizontal directions. The aim of this paper is to study the effect of Earth’s rotation on the free-fall of the gyroscope and give as functions of time the expected vertical and horizontal relative shifts between the rotating and non-rotating bodies. Consider the free-fall of the above gyro, which at the initial time $`t=0`$ is at rest at height $`h`$ over the Earth surface. According to the theory developed in , the equation of motion for the rotating inner ball in Earth’s gravitational field takes the form

$$m\stackrel{..}{𝐫}=\frac{GmM}{r^3}𝐫\kappa \frac{𝐬𝐒}{r^4}𝐫$$
$`(1)`$
to the first order of $`\kappa `$, where $`m`$ and $`M`$ are the masses of the test body and the Earth, respectively, $`𝐬`$ and $`𝐒`$ are the corresponding spin angular momentums, $`\kappa `$ is an arbitrary parameter related to the spin-spin coupling strength and the possible violations of the mass-velocity relation and equivalence principle. Solution of Eq. (1) to the first order of $`\delta `$ is

$$r=\frac{(1\delta )p}{1+e\mathrm{cos}(\sqrt{1\delta }\varphi +\pi )},$$
$`(2a)`$
and

$$\delta =\kappa \frac{𝐬𝐒}{GMm}\frac{1}{p},$$
$`(2b)`$
where $`p`$ and $`e`$ are integration constants. A nonzero value of $`\delta `$ would give perihelion precession of planet’s orbits in solar system and also violate the equivalence principle. The observations of the perihelion precession establish the upper limit on the parameter $`\kappa 3.4\times 10^{31}\mathrm{gram}^1`$(see ). A non-rotating and comoving coordinate system of Earth’s center is regarded as the inertial frame ($`r,\theta `$). Owing to Earth’s rotation, the free-fall gyro at the initial position $`𝐫|_{t=0}=(R+h)𝐞_r`$ would have the initial horizontal velocity $`𝐯|_{t=0}=𝐞_\theta \omega (R+h)\mathrm{sin}\alpha `$ where $`R`$ is Earth’s radius, $`\omega `$ is the angular velocity of Earth’s rotation, $`\alpha `$ is the colatitude of the gyro, $`𝐞_r`$ and $`𝐞_\theta `$ are the unit basic vectors in the inertial frame ($`r,\theta `$). The integration constants then become

$$p=\frac{\omega ^2(R+h)^4\mathrm{sin}^2\alpha }{GM},$$
$`(2c)`$
$$e=1\frac{p}{R+h}(1\delta ).$$
$`(2d)`$
Denote the eccentric anomaly $`E`$ which can be used for describing the angle $`\theta `$:

$$\mathrm{tan}\frac{\sqrt{1\delta }\theta }{2}=\sqrt{\frac{1e}{1+e}}\mathrm{tan}\frac{E}{2}.$$
$`(2e)`$
$`E`$ is determined by the Kepler equation

$$E+e\mathrm{sin}E=nt,n=\sqrt{GM/b^3},b=(R+h)/(1+e).$$
$`(2f)`$
Since higher order in $`\delta `$ has been ignored, the following expansions can be made:

$$r(t)=r^{}(t)+\mathrm{\Delta }r(t),\theta (t)=\theta ^{}(t)+\mathrm{\Delta }\theta (t),$$

$$E(t)=E^{}(t)+\mathrm{\Delta }E(t),e=e^{}+\mathrm{\Delta }e,n=n^{}+\mathrm{\Delta }n,$$
$`(3)`$
where the quantities with the prime are of zero-order in $`\delta `$, and the $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$ terms are proportional to $`\delta `$ (i.e. the first order in $`\delta `$). Putting the expansions into Eqs. (2a, d, e, f), we have the zero-order equations,

$$r^{}=\frac{p}{1+e^{}\mathrm{cos}(\theta ^{}+\pi )},$$
$`(4a)`$
$$\mathrm{tan}\frac{\theta ^{}}{2}=\sqrt{\frac{1e^{}}{1+e^{}}}\mathrm{tan}\frac{E^{}}{2},$$
$`(4b)`$
$$E^{}+e^{}\mathrm{sin}E^{}=n^{}t,$$
$`(4c)`$
$$e^{}=1p/(R+h),n^{}=\sqrt{GM/b^{}_{}{}^{}3},b^{}=(R+h)/(1+e^{}),$$
$`(4d)`$
and the first-order ones,

$$\mathrm{\Delta }r(t)=\frac{p\delta (1+e^{}\mathrm{cos}E^{})}{1e^2}+\frac{p\mathrm{cos}E^{}\mathrm{\Delta }epe^{}\mathrm{\Delta }E\mathrm{sin}E^{}}{1e^2}+\frac{2pe^{}(1+e^{}\mathrm{cos}E^{})\mathrm{\Delta }e}{(1e^2)^2},$$
$`(5a)`$
$$\mathrm{\Delta }\theta (t)=\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }E\mathrm{\Delta }Ee^{}\mathrm{cos}\theta ^{}}{\sqrt{1e^2}}\frac{\mathrm{sin}E^{}\mathrm{\Delta }e}{\sqrt{1e^2}(1+e\mathrm{cos}E^{})}+\frac{\delta \theta ^{}}{2},$$
$`(5b)`$
$$\mathrm{\Delta }E(t)=\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }nt\mathrm{\Delta }e\mathrm{sin}E^{}}{1+e^{}\mathrm{cos}E^{}},$$
$`(5c)`$
$$\mathrm{\Delta }e=\frac{p\delta }{R+h},\mathrm{\Delta }n=\frac{3n\mathrm{\Delta }e}{2(1+e^{})},$$
$`(5d)`$
where $`p`$ is given by Eq. (2c). For convenance of numerical calculation we rewrite Eqs. (5a)–(5c) as

$$\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }r(t)}{\delta }=\frac{p}{1+e^{}}\left(\frac{\mathrm{sin}^2E^{}(1e^{})(1\mathrm{cos}E^{})}{(1+e^{})(1+e^{}\mathrm{cos}E^{})}\frac{3n^{}te^{}\mathrm{sin}E^{}}{2(1+e^{})(1+e^{}\mathrm{cos}E^{})}\right),$$
$`(6a)`$
$$\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }\theta (t)}{\delta }=\frac{1e^{}\mathrm{cos}\theta ^{}}{\sqrt{1e^2}(1+e\mathrm{cos}E^{})}\frac{3n^{}t(1e^{})}{2(1+e^{})}\frac{(2e^{}\mathrm{cos}\theta ^{})\mathrm{sin}E^{}(1e^{})}{\sqrt{1e^2}(1+e\mathrm{cos}E^{})}+\frac{\theta ^{}}{2},$$
$`(6b)`$
where Eqs. (5c) and (5d) have been used.

We now denote the Cartesian coordinate system $`(X,Z)`$ in the orbital plane $`(r,\theta )`$ by

$$X=r\mathrm{sin}\theta ,Z=r\mathrm{cos}\theta ,$$
$`(7)`$
where $`Z`$-axis is in the vertical direction of Earth’s surface and $`X`$-axis is in the horizontal plane. The differences in unit of $`\delta `$ between the coordinates of the two orbits in the frame $`(X,Z)`$ are

$$\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }Z}{\delta }=(r\mathrm{cos}\theta r^{}\mathrm{cos}\theta ^{})/\delta =\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }r}{\delta }\mathrm{cos}\theta ^{}\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }\theta }{\delta }r^{}\mathrm{sin}\theta ^{},$$
$`(8a)`$
$$\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }X}{\delta }=(r\mathrm{sin}\theta r^{}\mathrm{sin}\theta ^{})/\delta =\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }r}{\delta }\mathrm{sin}\theta ^{}+\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }\theta }{\delta }r^{}\mathrm{cos}\theta ^{}.$$
$`(8b)`$
The zero-order equations (4a)-(4d) just describe the free-fall of the non-rotating outer shell which has the same initial conditions with the rotating inner ball, i.e., at the initial time $`t=0`$, $`r^{}(0)=r(0)=R+h,\theta (0)=\theta ^{}(0)=0`$ and $`v^{}(0)=v(0)=\omega (R+h)\mathrm{sin}\alpha `$. Thus at the initial time the first order quantities all vanish: $`\mathrm{\Delta }r(0)=\mathrm{\Delta }\theta (0)=0`$. Solving the equations (4), (6) and (8) we could get the differences in unit of $`\delta `$ for the orbits of the inner ball and outer shell, which are shown in Fig. 1.

We now consider acceleration of the rotating inner ball. From Eq. (1) we have

$$a_Z=\frac{GM}{r^2}\mathrm{cos}\theta \left(1+\frac{p\delta }{r}\right),$$
$`(9a)`$
$$a_X=\frac{GmM}{r^2}\mathrm{sin}\theta \left(1+\frac{p\delta }{r}\right),$$
$`(9b)`$
where $`\delta `$ is defined by (2b). By using Eq. (3) one can rewrite (9) as

$$\frac{a_Z}{a^{}}=\mathrm{cos}\theta ^{}\left(1\frac{2}{r^{}}\mathrm{\Delta }r\frac{\mathrm{sin}\theta ^{}}{\mathrm{cos}\theta ^{}}\mathrm{\Delta }\theta +\frac{p\delta }{r^{}}\right),$$
$`(10a)`$
$$\frac{a_X}{a^{}}=\mathrm{sin}\theta ^{}\left(1\frac{2}{r^{}}\mathrm{\Delta }r+\frac{\mathrm{cos}\theta ^{}}{\mathrm{sin}\theta ^{}}\mathrm{\Delta }\theta +\frac{p\delta }{r^{}}\right),$$
$`(10b)`$
and

$$a^{}=\frac{GM}{r^2},$$
$`(10c)`$
where $`r^{}(\theta ^{})`$ presents the orbit of the non-rotating outer shell and $`a^{}`$ is its acceleration. We then have the relative difference of the accelerations for the rotating ball and the non-rotating shell:

$$\frac{\eta _Z}{\delta }\frac{2\left(a_Za_Z^{}\right)}{\left(a+a^{}\right)\delta }=\mathrm{cos}\theta ^{}\left(\frac{2}{r^{}}\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }r}{\delta }+\frac{\mathrm{sin}\theta ^{}}{\mathrm{cos}\theta ^{}}\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }\theta }{\delta }\frac{p}{r^{}}\right),$$
$`(11a)`$
$$\frac{\eta _X}{\delta }\frac{2\left(a_Xa_X^{}\right)}{\left(a+a^{}\right)\delta }=\mathrm{sin}\theta ^{}\left(\frac{2}{r^{}}\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }r}{\delta }\frac{\mathrm{cos}\theta ^{}}{\mathrm{sin}\theta ^{}}\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }\theta }{\delta }\frac{p}{r^{}}\right).$$
$`(11b)`$
The numerical results of $`\eta _Z`$ and $`\eta _Z`$ in unit of $`\delta `$ are given in Fig. 2.

In Figs. 1 and 2, the units in the vertical axes depend on the quantity $`\delta `$ defined by Eq. (2b). For such a rotating ball with the radius of 5cm and the rotational speed of $`4\times 10^4`$ rpm, from Eq. (2b) where $`\kappa 3.4\times 10^{31}\mathrm{gram}^1`$(see ) we get

$$\delta 2\times 10^{12}.$$
$`(12)`$
For the drop capsule of 40 kilometer altitude, the free-fall time of the gyroscope is about, for instance, 40 seconds. In this case the maximal differences between the rotating inner ball and the non-rotating shell can be found from Figs. 1 and 2 and Eq. (12) as follows:

$$\mathrm{\Delta }Z21\delta \mathrm{m}4.2\times 10^9\mathrm{cm},\mathrm{\Delta }X1.7\delta \mathrm{cm}0.34\times 10^{11}\mathrm{cm},$$
$`(13)`$
$$\eta _z2.66\times 10^3\delta 5.3\times 10^{15},\eta _X0.67\times 10^5\delta 1.3\times 10^{17}.$$
$`(14)`$
The predictions given by Eqs. (13) and (14) could be detected by a SQUID magnetometer because such a magnetometer can be used to measure displacements as small as $`10^{13}`$ centimeters.

Acknowledgments This project was in part supported by NNSFC under Grant Nos. 19835040, 10175070 and 10047004 as well as also by NKBRSF G19990754.