Search for Heavy, Long-Lived Particles that Decay to Photons at CDF II

Abstract

We present the first search for heavy, long-lived particles that decay to photons at a hadron collider. We use a sample of photon+jet+missing transverse energy events in p-pbar collisions at \sqrt{s}=1.96 TeV taken with the CDF II detector. Candidate events are selected based on the arrival time of the photon at the detector. Using an integrated luminosity of 570 pb-1 of collision data, we observe 2 events, consistent with the background estimate of 1.3+-0.7 events. While our search strategy does not rely on model-specific dynamics, we set cross section limits in a supersymmetric model with \tildeχ_1^0->γ\gravitino and place the world-best 95% C.L. lower limit on the \tildeχ_1^0 mass of 101 GeV/c^2 at τ_{\tildeχ_1^0} = 5 ns.