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Chasing Higgsino dark matter at colliders in the neutrino fog era

Prudhvi N. Bhattiprolu1, Stephen P. Martin2, and James D. Wells3

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Phys. Rev. D 113, 095029 – Published 21 May, 2026

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/m7qf-j8j6

Abstract

Higgsinos can be the lightest supersymmetric particles, allowing for either a full or partial dark matter interpretation, with the correct thermal freeze-out abundance obtained for masses near 1.1 TeV. Dark matter direct detection experimental results, now rapidly approaching the neutrino fog, imposes increasingly stringent requirements on Higgsino purity. We begin by summarizing the purity constraints implied by the current strong limits from the LUX-ZEPLIN experiment in 2024, presenting them as lower bounds on gaugino masses in scenarios with decoupled sfermions and heavy Higgs bosons. We further quantify how these constraints will evolve as direct detection approaches various neutrino fog discovery and exclusion definitions and future exclusion projections. Finally, given that nearly pure Higgsinos remain notoriously challenging to probe directly at colliders, we explore complementary signatures in which Higgsinos are produced from the decays of heavier superpartners, where additional leptons and jets can be used for triggering. In particular, we advocate for searches of stop and wino pairs decaying directly to Higgsinos as a promising means to probe Higgsino dark matter well into the neutrino fog era.

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Phys. Rev. D 113, 095029– Published 21 May, 2026
  • Received 30 December 2025
  • Accepted 2 April 2026
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