Supersymmetry-breaking trilinear terms, known as A-terms, occupy a central place in supersymmetric phenomenology: large weak-scale values raise the Higgs boson mass toward m_h → 125 GeV and, at the same time, large negative values reduce the top-squark contributions to the weak scale, making the theory more natural. A new analysis shows how these parameters connect Standard Model supersymmetric phenomenology with the statistical structure of the string landscape.

The renormalization group evolution of the A-terms plays a decisive role in the landscape: large values can drive the top-squark soft terms to tachyonic values, generating scalar-potential minima that break charge and color (CCB). Just adjacent to those catastrophic regions lies the parameter space where m_h → 125 GeV and where the theory remains natural. It is an example of what the authors describe as "living dangerously" on the landscape: the statistical pull toward large soft terms stops just short of catastrophic minima, yet at that boundary nature turns out to be natural and with a Higgs mass close to the measured value.

In a final panoramic view, the work compares the reach of the HL-LHC for landscape-inspired supersymmetry through several prominent signatures in the higgsino versus gaugino mass plane, for the case of decoupled first- and second-generation scalars. The combination of Higgs mass prediction, naturalness and vacuum stability limits thus offers a concrete search window for the next high-luminosity run of the CERN collider.