A fresh look at ALP searches in fixed target experiments

• Main Authors: Lucian Harland–Lang, Joerg Jaeckel, Michael Spannowsky
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Elsevier 2019-06-01
• Series: Physics Letters B
• Online Access: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0370269319302783

A significant number of high power proton beams are available or will go online in the near future. This provides exciting opportunities for new fixed target experiments and the search for new physics in particular. In this note we will survey these beams and consider their potential to discover new physics in the form of axion-like particles, identifying promising locations and set ups. To achieve this, we present a significantly improved calculation of the production of axion-like particles in the coherent scattering of protons on nuclei, valid for lower ALP masses and/or beam energies. We also provide a new publicly available tool for this process: the Alpaca Monte Carlo generator. This will impact ongoing and planned searches based on this process.