Probing the axion-photon-dark photon interaction at future e⁺e⁻ colliders

We study the interaction between photons, dark photons, and axions at future lepton colliders, focusing on single-photon events with missing energy as the experimental signature. We find that future facilities such as the International Linear Collider, Circular Electron-Positron Collider, and Future Circular Collider will be sensitive to the axion–photon–dark photon coupling down to the order of 10⁻⁴ GeV⁻¹ for dark photon masses around Oð10 GeVÞ, assuming that the axion is extremely light and escapes detection. We further show that longitudinal beam polarization at the International Linear Collider can enhance the signal significance by a factor of 4, providing the strongest projected reach in the model parameter space. Existing constraints from Large Electron-Positron II are analyzed for comparison. Furthermore, the mass of dark photon can be determined by measuring the sharp dropoff in the distribution of the recoil mass.