Abstract: A considerable experimental effort is currently under way to test the persistent hints for oscillations due to an eV-scale sterile neutrino in the data of various reactor neutrino experiments. The assessment of the statistical significance of these hints is usually based on Wilks' theorem, whereby the assumption is made that the log-likelihood is chi 2-distributed. However, it is well known that the preconditions for the validity of Wilks' theorem are not fulfilled for neutrino oscillation experiments. In this work we derive a simple asymptotic form of the actual distribution of the log-likelihood based on reinterpreting the problem as fitting white Gaussian noise. From this formalism we show that, even in the absence of a sterile neutrino, the expectation value for the maximum likelihood estimate of the mixing angle remains non-zero with attendant large values of the log-likelihood. Our analytical results are then confirmed by numerical simulations of a toy reactor experiment. Finally, we apply this framework to the data of the Neutrino-4 experiment and show that the null hypothesis of no-oscillation is rejected at the 2.6 sigma level, compared to 3.2 sigma obtained under the assumption that Wilks' theorem applies.

Abstract: A coupled-channel approach is applied to the charged tetraquark state T-cc(+). recently discovered by the LHCb Collaboration. The parameters of the interaction are fixed by a fit to the observed line shape in the three-body (DD0)-D-0 pi(+) channel. Special attention is paid to the three-body dynamics in the T-cc(+) due to the finite life time of the D*. An approach to the T-cc(+) is argued to be self-consistent only if both manifestations of the three-body dynamics, the pion exchange between the D and D* mesons and the finite D* width, are taken into account simultaneously to ensure that three-body unitarity is preserved. This is especially important to precisely extract the pole position in the complex energy plane whose imaginary part is very sensitive to the details of the coupled-channel scheme employed. The (DD0)-D-0 and (DD+)-D-0 invariant mass distributions, predicted based on this analysis, are in good agreement with the LHCb data. The low-energy expansion of the D* D scattering amplitude is performed and the low-energy constants (the scattering length and effective range) are extracted. The compositeness parameter of the T-cc(+) is found to be close to unity, which implies that the T-cc(+) is a hadronic molecule generated by the interactions in the D*D-+(0) and D*D-0(+) channels. Employing heavy-quark spin symmetry, an isoscalar D* D* molecular partner of the T-cc(+) with J(P) = 1(+ )is predicted under the assumption that the DD* -D* D* coupled-channel effects can be neglected.

Abstract: A Dalitz plot analysis of the D-s(+) -> pi(-)pi(+)pi(+) decay is presented. The analysis is based on proton-proton collision data recorded by the LHCb experiment at a centre-of-mass energy of 8TeV and corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 1.5 fb(-1). The resonant structure of the decay is obtained using a quasi-model-independent partial-wave analysis, in which the pi(+)pi(-) S-wave amplitude is parameterised as a generic complex function determined by a fit to the data. The S-wave component is found to be dominant, followed by the contribution from spin-2 resonances and a small contribution from spin-1 resonances. The latter includes the first observation of the D-s(+) -> omega(782)pi(+) channel in the D-s(+) -> pi(-)pi(+)pi(+) decay. The resonant structures of the D-s(+) -> pi(-)pi(+)pi(+) and D+ -> pi(-)pi(+)pi(+) decays are compared, providing information about the mechanisms for the hadron formation in these decays.

Abstract: A dark photon may kinetically mix with the Standard Model photon, leading to observable cosmological signatures. The mixing is resonantly enhanced when the dark photon mass matches the primordial plasma frequency, which depends sensitively on the underlying spatial distribution of electrons. Crucially, inhomogeneities in this distribution can have a significant impact on the nature of resonant conversions. We develop and describe, for the first time, a general analytic formalism to treat resonant oscillations in the presence of inhomogeneities. Our formalism follows from the theory of level crossings of random fields and only requires knowledge of the one-point probability density function (PDF) of the underlying electron number density fluctuations. We validate our formalism using simulations and illustrate the photon-to-dark photon conversion probability for several different choices of PDFs that are used to characterize the low-redshift Universe.

Abstract: A data set corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 9 fb(-1) of proton-proton collisions collected by the LHCb experiment has been analysed to search for D-(s)(()*())+ ((D) over bar)(*)0 decays. The decays are fully or partially reconstructed, where one or two (8) missing neutral pions or photons from the decay of an excited charm meson are allowed. Upper limits for the branching fractions, normalised to B+ decays to final states with similar topologies, are obtained for sixteen B-c(+) decay modes. For the decay B-c(+) -> D-s(+)(D) over bar (0), an excess with a significance of 3.4 standard deviations is found.