A NEW SEARCH FOR LEPTON FLAVOR VIOLATION IN HIGH-Q2 POSITRON-PROTON COLLISIONS

Abstract

A search for Lepton Flavor Violation in Deeply Inelastic positron-proton scattering was conducted at the HERA Colider, using the ZEUS detector. This process permits the probing of the four-fermion interaction, in particular those terms that involve two quarks and two leptons. Strong limits exist from rare decays and from lower-energy experiments, but they involve the lighter quarks. At HERA, limits can be set that also involve interactions with heavier sea quarks, and all three lepton families. these limits define the energy scale probed in the effective Lagrangian, and, in a more specific model, involving leptoquarks. While no events survived the selection criteria, two interesting candidate events are discussed.