Barragan, C., & Olmo, G. J. (2010). Isotropic and anisotropic bouncing cosmologies in Palatini gravity. Phys. Rev. D, 82(8), 084015–15pp.
Abstract: We study isotropic and anisotropic (Bianchi I) cosmologies in Palatini f(R) and f(R, R μnu R μnu) theories of gravity with a perfect fluid and consider the existence of nonsingular bouncing solutions in the early universe. We find that all f(R) models with isotropic bouncing solutions develop shear singularities in the anisotropic case. On the contrary, the simple quadratic model R + aR(2)/R-P + R μnu R μnu/R-P exhibits regular bouncing solutions in both isotropic and anisotropic cases for a wide range of equations of state, including dust (for a<0) and radiation (for arbitrary a). It thus represents a purely gravitational solution to the big bang singularity and anisotropy problems of general relativity without the need for exotic (w>1) sources of matter/energy or extra degrees of freedom.
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Baron, R., Boucaud, P., Dimopoulos, P., Frezzotti, R., Palao, D., Rossi, G., et al. (2010). Light meson physics from maximally twisted mass lattice QCD. J. High Energy Phys., 08(8), 097–41pp.
Abstract: We present a comprehensive investigation of light meson physics using maximally twisted mass fermions for N-f = 2 mass-degenerate quark flavours. By employing four values of the lattice spacing, spatial lattice extents ranging from 2.0 fm to 2.5 fm and pseudo scalar masses in the range 280 less than or similar to m(PS) less than or similar to 650MeV we control the major systematic effects of our calculation. This enables us to confront our N-f = 2 data with SU(2) chiral perturbation theory and extract low energy constants of the effective chiral Lagrangian and derived quantities, such as the light quark mass.
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Barenboim, G., & Panotopoulos, G. (2010). Gravitino dark matter in the constrained next-to-minimal supersymmetric standard model with neutralino next-to-lightest superpartner. J. High Energy Phys., 09, 011–20pp.
Abstract: The viability of a possible cosmological scenario is investigated. The theoretical framework is the constrained next-to-minimal supersymmetric standard model (cNMSSM), with a gravitino playing the role of the lightest supersymmetric particle (LSP) and a neutralino acting as the next-to-lightest supersymmetric particle (NLSP). All the necessary constraints from colliders and cosmology have been taken into account. For gravitino we have considered the two usual production mechanisms, namely out-of equillibrium decay from the NLSP, and scattering processes from the thermal bath. The maximum allowed reheating temperature after inflation, as well as the maximum allowed gravitino mass are determined.
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Barenboim, G., Fernandez-Martinez, E., Mena, O., & Verde, L. (2010). The dark side of curvature. J. Cosmol. Astropart. Phys., 03(3), 008–17pp.
Abstract: Geometrical tests such as the combination of the Hubble parameter H(z) and the angular diameter distance d(A)(z) can, in principle, break the degeneracy between the dark energy equation of state parameter w(z), and the spatial curvature Omega(k) in a direct, model-independent way. In practice, constraints on these quantities achievable from realistic experiments, such as those to be provided by Baryon Acoustic Oscillation (BAO) galaxy surveys in combination with CMB data, can resolve the cosmic confusion between the dark energy equation of state parameter and curvature only statistically and within a parameterized model for w(z). Combining measurements of both H(z) and d(A)(z) up to sufficiently high redshifts z similar to 2 and employing a parameterization of the redshift evolution of the dark energy equation of state are the keys to resolve the w(z) – Omega(k) degeneracy.
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Barenboim, G. (2010). Gravity triggered neutrino condensates. Phys. Rev. D, 82(9), 093014–13pp.
Abstract: In this work we use the Schwinger-Dyson equations to study the possibility that an enhanced gravitational attraction triggers the formation of a right-handed neutrino condensate, inducing dynamical symmetry breaking and generating a Majorana mass for the right-handed neutrino at a scale appropriate for the seesaw mechanism. The composite field formed by the condensate phase could drive an early epoch of inflation. We find that to the lowest order, the theory does not allow dynamical symmetry breaking. Nevertheless, thanks to the large number of matter fields in the model, the suppression by additional powers in G of higher order terms can be compensated, boosting them up to their lowest order counterparts. This way chiral symmetry can be broken dynamically and the infrared mass generated turns out to be in the expected range for a successful seesaw scenario.
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