Color-singlet and color-octet vector bosons predicted in theories beyond the Standard Model have the potential to be discovered as dijet resonances at the LHC. A color-singlet resonance that has leptophobic couplings needs further investigation to be
distinguished from a color-octet one. In previous work, we introduced a method for discriminating between the two kinds of resonances when their couplings are flavor-universal, using measurements of the dijet resonance mass, total decay width and production cross-section. Here, we describe two extensions of that work. First, we broaden the method to the case where the vector resonances have flavor non-universal couplings, by incorporating measurements of the heavy-flavor decays of the resonance. Second, we apply the method to separating vector bosons from color-octet scalars and excited quarks.
We introduce a deconstructed model that incorporates both Higgsless and top-color mechanisms. The model alleviates the typical tension in Higgsless models between obtaining the correct top quark mass and keeping delta-rho small. It does so by singlin
g out the top quark mass generation as arising from a Yukawa coupling to an effective top-Higgs which develops a small vacuum expectation value, while electroweak symmetry breaking results largely from a Higgsless mechanism. As a result, the heavy partners of the SM fermions can be light enough to be seen at the LHC.
The three-site model has been offered as a benchmark for studying the collider phenomenology of Higgsless models. In this paper we analyze how well the three-site model performs as a general exemplar of Higgsless models in describing W_L W_L scatteri
ng, and which modifications can make it more representative. We employ general sum rules relating the masses and couplings of the Kaluza-Klein (KK) modes of the gauge fields in continuum and deconstructed Higgsless models as a way to compare the different theories. We show that the size of the four-point vertex for the (unphysical) Nambu-Goldstone modes and the degree to which the sum rules are saturated by contributions from the lowest-lying KK resonances both provide good measures of the extent to which a highly-deconstructed theory can accurately describe the low-energy physics of a continuum 5d Higgsless model. After comparing the three-site model to flat and warped continuum models, we analyze extensions of the three-site model to a longer open linear moose with an additional U(1) group and to a ring (BESS or hidden local symmetry) model with three sites and three links. Both cases may be readily analyzed in the framework of the general sum rules. We demonstrate that W_L W_L scattering in the ring model can very closely approximate scattering in the continuum models, provided that the hidden local symmetry parameter `a is chosen to mimic rho-meson dominance of pion-pion scattering in QCD. The hadron and lepton collider phenomenology of both extended models is briefly discussed, with a focus on the complementary information to be gained from precision measurements of the Z line shape and ZWW coupling at a high-energy lepton collider.
