Looking for an axion in a haystack of muons

摘要

The search for axion-like particles X in muon decays is an excellent opportunity for the MEG II and Mu3e experiments to extend their horizons beyond μ~+ → e~+γ and μ~+ → e~+e~-e~+. A suitable process for both experiments is the two-body decay μ~+ → e~+X, whose only signature is a monochromatic peak close to the kinematic endpoint of the positron energy spectrum of the μ~+ → e~+ν_e ν_μ background. The hunt for such an elusive signal in a vast amount of irreducible background requires extremely accurate theoretical predictions to be implemented in a Monte Carlo event generator. This work presents a new state-of-the-art computation of μ~+ → e~+ν_e ν_μ for polarised muons, accomplished with the McMule framework. The calculation includes nextto- next-leading order QED corrections and logarithmically enhanced terms at even higher orders. The results are also used to estimate the sensitivity of both experiments on the branching ratio of μ~+ → e~+X, in order to evaluate the impact of the theoretical error.