Production of axionlike particles in Pb Pb collisions at the LHC, HE-LHC and FCC: A phenomenological analysis

The production of axionlike particles (ALP) in ultraperipheral Pb Pb collisions (UPHIC) is investigated considering the energies of the next run of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) and of the future High Energy-LHC (HE-LHC) and Future Circular Collider (FCC). Assuming four different combinations for the ALP mass and coupling and the typical exclusivity cuts for central and forward detectors, we estimate the cross section and invariant mass, rapidity, transverse momentum and acoplanarity distributions associated to the diphoton final state produced in the gamma gamma -> a -> gamma gamma subprocesses. A detailed analysis of the backgrounds is performed. We demonstrate that the backgrounds can be strongly reduced by the exclusivity cuts and that a forward detector, as the LHCb, is ideal to probe an ALP with small mass. Finally, our results indicate that a future experimental analysis of the diphoton final state in UPHIC can probe the existence and properties of axionlike particles. (C) 2020 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier B.V.