Abstract: We consider eternal inflation in hilltop-type inflation models, favored by current data, in which the scalar field in inflation rolls off of a local maximum of the potential. Unlike chaotic or plateau-type inflation models, in hilltop inflation the region of field space which supports eternal inflation is finite, and the expansion rate H-EI during eternal inflation is almost exactly the same as the expansion rate H-* during slow roll inflation. Therefore, in any given Hubble volume, there is a finite and calculable expectation value for the lifetime of the “eternal” inflation phase, during which quantum flucutations dominate over classical field evolution. We show that despite this, inflation in hilltop models is nonetheless eternal in the sense that the volume of the spacetime at any finite time is exponentially dominated by regions which continue to inflate. This is true regardless of the energy scale of inflation, and eternal inflation is supported for inflation at arbitrarily low energy scale.

Abstract: We consider the two-dimensional alternate quantum walk on a cylinder. We concentrate on the study of the motion along the open dimension, in the spirit of looking at the closed coordinate as a small or “hidden” extra dimension. If one starts from localized initial conditions on the lattice, the dynamics of the quantum walk that is obtained after tracing out the small dimension shows the contribution of several components which can be understood from the study of the dispersion relations for this problem. In fact, these components originate from the contribution of the possible values of the quasimomentum in the closed dimension. In the continuous space-time limit, the different components manifest as a set of Dirac equations, with each quasimomentum providing the value of the corresponding mass. We briefly discuss the possible link of these ideas to the simulation of high-energy physical theories that include extra dimensions. Finally, entanglement between the coin and spatial degrees of freedom is studied, showing that the entanglement entropy clearly overcomes the value reached with only one spatial dimension.

Abstract: We critically examine recent claims of a high solar metallicity by von Steiger & Zurbuchen (2016, vSZ16) based onin situ measurements of the solar wind, rather than the standard spectroscopically inferred abundances (Asplund et al. 2009, hereafter AGSS09). We test the claim by Vagnozzi et al. (2016) that a composition based on the solar wind enables one to construct a standard solar model in agreement with helioseismological observations and thus solve the decades-old solar modelling problem. We show that, although some helioseismological observables are improved compared to models computed with spectroscopic abundances, most are in fact worse. The high abundance of refractory elements leads to an overproduction of neutrinos, with a predicted B-8 flux that is nearly twice its observed value, and Be-7 and CNO fluxes that are experimentally ruled out at high confidence. A combined likelihood analysis shows that models using the vSZ16 abundances are worse than AGSS09 despite a higher metallicity. We also present astrophysical and spectroscopic arguments showing the vSZ16 composition to be an implausible representation of the solar interior, identifying the first ionization potential effect in the outer solar atmosphere and wind as the likely culprit.

Abstract: We describe in detail a previously published measurement of CP violation in B-0-(B) over bar (0) oscillations, based on an integrated luminosity of 425.7 fb(-1) collected by the BABAR experiment at the PEPII collider. We apply a novel technique to a sample of about 6 million (B) over bar (0) -> D*(+)l(-)(nu) over bar (l) decays selected with partial reconstruction of the D*(+) meson. The charged lepton identifies the flavor of one B meson at its decay time, the flavor of the other B is determined by kaon tagging. We determine a CP violating asymmetry A(CP) = (N((BB0)-B-0) – N((B) over bar (0)(B) over bar (0)))/(N((BB0)-B-0) + N((B) over bar (0)(B) over bar (0))) = (0.06 +/- 0.17(-0.32)(+0.38))% corresponding to Delta(CP) = 1-vertical bar q/p vertical bar = (0.29 +/- 0.84(-1.61)(+1.88)) x 10(-3). This measurement is consistent and competitive with those obtained at the B factories with dilepton events.

Abstract: We discuss a scenario of the type-II two-Higgs- doublet model (2HDM) in which the b (b) over bar gamma gamma rate of the Higgs pair production is enhanced due to the two nearly degenerate 125 GeV Higgs bosons ( h, H). Considering various theoretical and experimental constraints, we figure out the allowed ranges of the trilinear couplings of these two Higgs bosons and calculate the signal rate of b (b) over bar gamma gamma from the productions of Higgs pairs (hh, hH, HH) at the large hadron collider (LHC). We find that in the allowed parameter space some trilinear Higgs couplings can be larger than the Standard Model (SM) value by an order and the production rate of b _ b.. can be greatly enhanced. We also consider a “decoupling” benchmark point where the light CP-even Higgs has a SM-like cubic self-coupling while other trilinear couplings are very small. With a detailed simulation on the b (b) over bar gamma gamma signal and backgrounds, we find that in such a “decoupling” scenario the hh and hH channels can jointly enhance the statistical significance to 5 sigma at 14 TeV LHC with an integrated luminosity of 3000 fb(-1).