Searching for displaced vertices with a gaseous tracker for a future e+e− Higgs factory

A bstract This paper presents results of the first full simulation study addressing prospects for observation of long-lived particles (LLPs) with the International Large Detector (ILD), operating at the International Linear Collider (ILC) at $$ \sqrt{s} $$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:msqrt> <mml:mi>s</mml:mi> </mml:msqrt> </mml:math> = 250 GeV. Neutral LLP production, resulting in a displaced vertex signature inside the ILD’s time projection chamber (TPC), is considered. We focus on scenarios interesting from the experimental perspective and perform a search based on displaced vertex finding inside the TPC volume. Two experimentally challenging scenarios are explored: the first involving very soft final states due to a small mass splitting between a heavy LLP and the dark matter particle to which it decays, and the second with production of a light and therefore highly boosted LLP resulting in almost colinear vertex tracks. The expected limits on the signal production cross section are presented for a wide range of the LLP proper lifetimes corresponding to cτ from 0.1 mm to 10 km.