Search for excited electrons in pp collisions at √s = 1.96 TeV

Authors

• V. M. Abazov, Joint Institute for Nuclear Research, Dubna, Russia
• Kenneth A. Bloom, University of Nebraska-LincolnFollow
• Gregory Snow, University of Nebraska-LincolnFollow
• D0 Collaboration

Document Type

Article

Date of this Version

May 2008

Comments

Published by American Physical Society. Phys. Rev. D 77, 091102(R) (2008). http://prd.aps.org. Copyright © 2008 American Physical Society. Permission to use.

Abstract

We present the results of a search for the production of an excited state of the electron, e^*, in protonantiproton collisions at √s = 1.96 TeV. The data were collected with the D0 experiment at the Fermilab Tevatron Collider and correspond to an integrated luminosity of approximately 1 fb^-1.We search for e^* in the process pp → e^*e, with the e^* subsequently decaying to an electron plus photon. No excess above the standard model background is observed. Interpreting our data in the context of a model that describes e^* production by four-fermion contact interactions and e_ decay via electroweak processes, we set 95% C.L. upper limits on the production cross section ranging from 8.9 to 27 fb, depending on the mass of the excited electron. Choosing the scale for contact interactions to be Λ = 1 TeV, excited electron masses below 756 GeV are excluded at the 95% C.L.