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Adolf, P., Hirsch, M., & Päs, H. (2023). Radiative neutrino masses and the Cohen-Kaplan-Nelson bound. J. High Energy Phys., 11(11), 078–14pp.
Abstract: Recently, an increasing interest in UV/IR mixing phenomena has drawn attention to the range of validity of standard quantum field theory. Here we explore the consequences of such a limited range of validity in the context of radiative models for neutrino mass generation. We adopt an argument first published by Cohen, Kaplan and Nelson that gravity implies both UV and IR cutoffs, apply it to the loop integrals describing radiative corrections, and demonstrate that this effect has significant consequences for the parameter space of radiative neutrino mass models.
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Jueid, A., Kip, J., Ruiz de Austri, R., & Skands, P. (2024). The Strong Force meets the Dark Sector: a robust estimate of QCD uncertainties for anti-matter dark matter searches. J. High Energy Phys., 02(2), 119–48pp.
Abstract: In dark-matter annihilation channels to hadronic final states, stable particles – such as positrons, photons, antiprotons, and antineutrinos – are produced via complex sequences of phenomena including QED/QCD radiation, hadronisation, and hadron decays. These processes are normally modelled by Monte Carlo (MC) event generators whose limited accuracy imply intrinsic QCD uncertainties on the predictions for indirect-detection experiments like Fermi-LAT, Pamela, IceCube or Ams-02. In this article, we perform a comprehensive analysis of QCD uncertainties, meaning both perturbative and nonperturbative sources of uncertainty are included – estimated via variations of MC renormalization-scale and fragmentation-function parameters, respectively – in antimatter spectra from dark-matter annihilation, based on parametric variations of the Pythia 8 event generator. After performing several retunings of light-quark fragmentation functions, we define a set of variations that span a conservative estimate of the QCD uncertainties. We estimate the effects on antimatter spectra for various annihilation channels and final-state particle species, and discuss their impact on fitted values for the dark-matter mass and thermally-averaged annihilation cross section. We find dramatic impacts which can go up to O(10%) for the annihilation cross section. We provide the spectra in tabulated form including QCD uncertainties and code snippets to perform fast dark-matter fits, in this github repository.
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Ghoshal, A., Gouttenoire, Y., Heurtier, L., & Simakachorn, P. (2023). Primordial black hole archaeology with gravitational waves from cosmic strings. J. High Energy Phys., 08(8), 196–43pp.
Abstract: Light primordial black holes (PBHs) with masses smaller than 10(9) g (10(-24) M-circle dot) evaporate before the onset of Big-Bang nucleosynthesis, rendering their detection rather challenging. If efficiently produced, they may have dominated the universe energy density. We study how such an early matter-dominated era can be probed successfully using gravitational waves (GW) emitted by local and global cosmic strings. While previous studies showed that a matter era generates a single-step suppression of the GW spectrum, we instead find a double-step suppression for local-string GW whose spectral shape provides information on the duration of the matter era. The presence of the two steps in the GW spectrum originates from GW being produced through two events separated in time: loop formation and loop decay, taking place either before or after the matter era. The second step – called the knee – is a novel feature which is universal to any early matter-dominated era and is not only specific to PBHs. Detecting GWs from cosmic strings with LISA, ET, or BBO would set constraints on PBHs with masses between 10(6) and 10(9) g for local strings with tension G μ= 10(-11), and PBHs masses between 10(4) and 10(9) g for global strings with symmetry-breaking scale eta = 10(15) GeV. Effects from the spin of PBHs are discussed.
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De Romeri, V., Papoulias, D. K., & Ternes, C. A. (2024). Light vector mediators at direct detection experiments. J. High Energy Phys., 05(5), 165–22pp.
Abstract: Solar neutrinos induce elastic neutrino-electron scattering in dark matter direct detection experiments, resulting in detectable event rates at current facilities. We analyze recent data from the XENONnT, LUX-ZEPLIN, and PandaX-4T experiments and we derive stringent constraints on several U(1) ' extensions of the Standard Model, accommodating new neutrino-electron interactions. We provide bounds on the relevant coupling and mass of light vector mediators for a variety of models, including the anomaly-free B – L model, lepton flavor-dependent interactions like L alpha – L beta , B – 2L e – L mu,tau , B – 3L alpha , and B + 2L μ+ 2L tau models. We compare our results with other limits obtained in the literature from both terrestrial and astrophysical experiments. Finally, we present forecasts for improving current bounds with a future experiment like DARWIN.
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Kalliokoski, M., Mitsou, V. A., de Montigny, M., Mukhopadhyay, A., Ouimet, P. P. A., Pinfold, J., et al. (2024). Searching for minicharged particles at the energy frontier with the MoEDAL-MAPP experiment at the LHC. J. High Energy Phys., 04(4), 137–22pp.
Abstract: The MoEDAL's Apparatus for Penetrating Particles (MAPP) Experiment is designed to expand the search for new physics at the LHC, significantly extending the physics program of the baseline MoEDAL Experiment. The Phase-1 MAPP detector (MAPP-1) is currently undergoing installation at the LHC's UA83 gallery adjacent to the LHCb/MoEDAL region at Interaction Point 8 and will begin data-taking in early 2024. The focus of the MAPP experiment is on the quest for new feebly interacting particles – avatars of new physics with extremely small Standard Model couplings, such as minicharged particles (mCPs). In this study, we present the results of a comprehensive analysis of MAPP-1's sensitivity to mCPs arising in the canonical model involving the kinetic mixing of a massless dark U(1) gauge field with the Standard Model hypercharge gauge field. We focus on several dominant production mechanisms of mCPs at the LHC across the mass-mixing parameter space of interest to MAPP: Drell-Yan pair production, direct decays of heavy quarkonia and light vector mesons, and single Dalitz decays of pseudoscalar mesons. The 95% confidence level background-free sensitivity of MAPP-1 for mCPs produced at the LHC's Run 3 and the HL-LHC through these mechanisms, along with projected constraints on the minicharged strongly interacting dark matter window, are reported. Our results indicate that MAPP-1 exhibits sensitivity to sizable regions of unconstrained parameter space and can probe effective charges as low as 8 x 10 -4 e and 6 x 10 -4 e for Run 3 and the HL-LHC, respectively.
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Olmo, G. J. (2011). Palatini actions and quantum gravity phenomenology. J. Cosmol. Astropart. Phys., 10(10), 018–15pp.
Abstract: We show that an invariant an universal length scale can be consistently introduced in a generally covariant theory through the gravitational sector using the Palatini approach. The resulting theory is able to capture different aspects of quantum gravity phenomenology in a single framework. In particular, it is found that in this theory field excitations propagating with different energy-densities perceive different background metrics, which is a fundamental characteristic of the DSR and Rainbow Gravity approaches. We illustrate these properties with a particular gravitational model and explicitly show how the soccer ball problem is avoided in this framework. The isotropic and anisotropic cosmologies of this model also avoid the big bang singularity by means of a big bounce.
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Olmo, G. J. (2011). Palatini approach to modified gravity: f(R) theories and beyond. Int. J. Mod. Phys. D, 20(4), 413–462.
Abstract: We review the recent literature on modified theories of gravity in the Palatini approach. After discussing the motivations that lead to consider alternatives to Einstein's theory and to treat the metric and the connection as independent objects, we review several topics that have been recently studied within this framework. In particular, we provide an in-depth analysis of the cosmic speed-up problem, laboratory and solar system tests, the structure of stellar objects, the Cauchy problem, and bouncing cosmologies. We also discuss the importance of going beyond the f(R) models to capture other phenomenological aspects related with dark matter/energy and quantum gravity.
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Hidalgo-Duque, C., & Llanes-Estrada, F. J. (2015). Soft interactions in jet quenching. Int. J. Mod. Phys. A, 30(13), 1550067–25pp.
Abstract: We study the collisional aspects of jet quenching in a high-energy nuclear collision, especially in the final state pion gas. The jet has a large energy, and acquires momentum transverse to its axis more effectively by multiple soft collisions than by few hard scatterings (as known from analogous systems such as J/psi production at Hera). Such regime of large E and small momentum transfer corresponds to Regge kinematics and is characteristically dominated by the pomeron. From this insight we estimate the jet quenching parameter in the hadron medium (largely a pion gas) at the end of the collision, which is naturally small and increases with temperature in line with the gas density and compare it to the jet quenching parameter obtained within the quark-gluon plasma (QGP) phase in widely known perturbative approximations. The physics in the quark-gluon plasma/liquid phase is less obvious, and here we revisit a couple of simple estimates that suggest indeed that the pomeron-mediated interactions are very relevant and should be included in analysis of the jet quenching parameter. Finally, since the occasional hard collisions produce features characteristic of a Levy flight in the q(perpendicular to)(2) plane perpendicular to the jet axis, we suggest one- and two-particle q perpendicular to correlations as interesting experimental probes sensitive to the nature (softness versus hardness) of the interactions of a jet inside the QGP.
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Ghosh, P., Lara, I., Lopez-Fogliani, D. E., Muñoz, C., & Ruiz de Austri, R. (2018). Searching for left sneutrino LSP at the LHC. Int. J. Mod. Phys. A, 33(18-19), 1850110–62pp.
Abstract: We analyze relevant signals expected at the LHC for a left sneutrino as the lightest supersymmetric particle (LSP). The discussion is carried out in the “mu from nu” supersymmetric standard model (mu nu SSM), where the presence of R-parity breaking couplings involving right-handed neutrinos solves the μproblem and reproduces neutrino data. The sneutrinos are pair produced via a virtual W, Z or gamma in the s channel. From the prompt decay of a pair of left sneutrinos LSPs of any family, a significant diphoton signal plus missing transverse energy (MET) from neutrinos can be present in the mass range 118-132 GeV, with 13 TeV center-of-mass energy and an integrated luminosity of 100 fb(-1). In addition, in the case of a pair of tau left sneutrinos LSPs, given the large value of the tau Yukawa coupling diphoton plus leptons and/or multileptons can appear. We find that the number of expected events for the multilepton signal, together with properly adopted search strategies, is sufficient to give a significant evidence for a sneutrino of mass in the range 130-310 GeV, even with the integrated luminosity of 20 fb(-1). In the case of the signal producing diphoton plus leptons, an integrated luminosity of 100 fb(-1) is needed to give a significant evidence in the mass range 95-145 GeV. Finally, we discuss briefly the presence of displaced vertices and the associated range of masses.
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Bordes, J., Hong-Mo, C., & Tsun, T. S. (2018). The Z boson in the framed standard model. Int. J. Mod. Phys. A, 33(32), 1850190–19pp.
Abstract: The framed standard model (FSM), constructed initially for explaining the existence of three fermion generations and the hierarchical mass and mixing patterns of quarks and leptons,(1,2) suggests also a “hidden sector” of particles(3) including some dark matter candidates. It predicts in addition a new vector boson G, with mass of order TeV, which mixes with the gamma and Z of the standard model yielding deviations from the standard mixing scheme, all calculable in terms of a single unknown parameter mG. Given that standard mixing has been tested already to great accuracy by experiment, this could lead to contradictions, but it is shown here that for the three crucial and testable cases so far studied (i) m(Z) – m(W), (ii) Gamma(Z -> l(+)l(-)), (iii) Gamma(Z -> hadrons), the deviations are all within the present stringent experimental bounds provided m(G) > 1 TeV, but should soon be detectable if experimental accuracy improves. This comes about because of some subtle cancellations, which might have a deeper reason that is not yet understood. By virtue of mixing, G can be produced at the LHC and appear as a l(+)l(-) anomaly. If found, it will be of interest not only for its own sake but serve also as a window on to the “hidden sector” into which it will mostly decay, with dark matter candidates as most likely products.
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