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Ferreira, M. N., & Papavassiliou, J. (2023). Gauge Sector Dynamics in QCD. Particles, 6(1), 312–363.
Abstract: The dynamics of the QCD gauge sector give rise to non-perturbative phenomena that are crucial for the internal consistency of the theory; most notably, they account for the generation of a gluon mass through the action of the Schwinger mechanism, the taming of the Landau pole, the ensuing stabilization of the gauge coupling, and the infrared suppression of the three-gluon vertex. In the present work, we review some key advances in the ongoing investigation of this sector within the framework of the continuum Schwinger function methods, supplemented by results obtained from lattice simulations.
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Figueroa, D. G., Raatikainen, S., Rasanen, S., & Tomberg, E. (2022). Implications of stochastic effects for primordial black hole production in ultra-slow-roll inflation. J. Cosmol. Astropart. Phys., 05(5), 027–48pp.
Abstract: We study the impact of stochastic noise on the generation of primordial black hole (PBH) seeds in ultra-slow-roll (USR) inflation with numerical simulations. We consider the non-linearity of the system by consistently taking into account the noise dependence on the inflaton perturbations, while evolving the perturbations on the coarse-grained background affected by the noise. We capture in this way the non-Markovian nature of the dynamics, and demonstrate that non-Markovian effects are subleading. Using the Delta N formalism, we find the probability distribution P(R) of the comoving curvature perturbation R. We consider inflationary potentials that fit the CMB and lead to PBH dark matter with i) asteroid, ii) solar, or iii) Planck mass, as well as iv) PBHs that form the seeds of supermassive black holes. We find that stochastic effects enhance the PBH abundance by a factor of O(10)-O(10(8)), depending on the PBH mass. We also show that the usual approximation, where stochastic kicks depend only on the Hubble rate, either underestimates or overestimates the abundance by orders of magnitude, depending on the potential. We evaluate the gauge dependence of the results, discuss the quantum-to-classical transition, and highlight open issues of the application of the stochastic formalism to USR inflation.
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Garani, R., & Palomares-Ruiz, S. (2022). Evaporation of dark matter from celestial bodies. J. Cosmol. Astropart. Phys., 05(5), 042–53pp.
Abstract: Scatterings of galactic dark matter (DM) particles with the constituents of celestial bodies could result in their accumulation within these objects. Nevertheless, the finite temperature of the medium sets a minimum mass, the evaporation mass, that DM particles must have in order to remain trapped. DM particles below this mass are very likely to scatter to speeds higher than the escape velocity, so they would be kicked out of the capturing object and escape. Here, we compute the DM evaporation mass for all spherical celestial bodies in hydrostatic equilibrium, spanning the mass range [10(-)(10) – 10(2)] M-circle dot, for constant scattering cross sections and s-wave annihilations. We illustrate the critical importance of the exponential tail of the evaporation rate, which has not always been appreciated in recent literature, and obtain a robust result: for the geometric value of the scattering cross section and for interactions with nucleons, at the local galactic position, the DM evaporation mass for all spherical celestial bodies in hydrostatic equilibrium is approximately given by E-c/T-chi similar to 30, where E-c is the escape energy of DM particles at the core of the object and T-chi is their temperature. In that case, the minimum value of the DM evaporation mass is obtained for super-Jupiters and brown dwarfs, m(ev)(ap) similar or equal to 0.7 GeV. For other values of the scattering cross section, the DM evaporation mass only varies by a factor smaller than three within the range 10(-41) cm(2) <= sigma(p) <= 10(-31) cm(2), where sigma(p) is the spin-independent DM-nucleon scattering cross section. Its dependence on parameters such as the galactic DM density and velocity, or the scattering and annihilation cross sections is only logarithmic, and details on the density and temperature profiles of celestial bodies have also a small impact.
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Gariazzo, S., Archidiacono, M., de Salas, P. F., Mena, O., Ternes, C. A., & Tortola, M. (2018). Neutrino masses and their ordering: global data, priors and models. J. Cosmol. Astropart. Phys., 03(3), 011–22pp.
Abstract: We present a full Bayesian analysis of the combination of current neutrino oscillation, neutrinoless double beta decay and Cosmic Microwave Background observations. Our major goal is to carefully investigate the possibility to single out one neutrino mass ordering, namely Normal Ordering or Inverted Ordering, with current data. Two possible parametrizations (three neutrino masses versus the lightest neutrino mass plus the two oscillation mass splittings) and priors (linear versus logarithmic) are exhaustively examined. We find that the preference for NO is only driven by neutrino oscillation data. Moreover, the values of the Bayes factor indicate that the evidence for NO is strong only when the scan is performed over the three neutrino masses with logarithmic priors; for every other combination of parameterization and prior, the preference for NO is only weak. As a by-product of our Bayesian analyses, we are able to (a) compare the Bayesian bounds on the neutrino mixing parameters to those obtained by means of frequentist approaches, finding a very good agreement; (b) determine that the lightest neutrino mass plus the two mass splittings parametrization, motivated by the physical observables, is strongly preferred over the three neutrino mass eigenstates scan and (c) find that logarithmic priors guarantee a weakly-to-moderately more efficient sampling of the parameter space. These results establish the optimal strategy to successfully explore the neutrino parameter space, based on the use of the oscillation mass splittings and a logarithmic prior on the lightest neutrino mass, when combining neutrino oscillation data with cosmology and neutrinoless double beta decay. We also show that the limits on the total neutrino mass Sigma m(nu) can change dramatically when moving from one prior to the other. These results have profound implications for future studies on the neutrino mass ordering, as they crucially state the need for self-consistent analyses which explore the best parametrization and priors, without combining results that involve different assumptions.
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Gariazzo, S., Gerbino, M., Brinckmann, T., Lattanzi, M., Mena, O., Schwetz, T., et al. (2022). Neutrino mass and mass ordering: no conclusive evidence for normal ordering. J. Cosmol. Astropart. Phys., 10(10), 010–18pp.
Abstract: The extraction of the neutrino mass ordering is one of the major challenges in particle physics and cosmology, not only for its implications for a fundamental theory of mass generation in nature, but also for its decisive role in the scale of future neutrinoless double beta decay experimental searches. It has been recently claimed that current oscillation, beta decay and cosmological limits on the different observables describing the neutrino mass parameter space provide robust decisive Bayesian evidence in favor of the normal ordering of the neutrino mass spectrum [1]. We further investigate these strong claims using a rich and wide phenomenology, with different sampling techniques of the neutrino parameter space. Contrary to the findings of Jimenez et al. [1], no decisive evidence for the normal mass ordering is found. Neutrino mass ordering analyses must rely on priors and parameterizations that are ordering-agnostic: robust results should be regarded as those in which the preference for the normal neutrino mass ordering is driven exclusively by the data, while we find a difference of up to a factor of 33 in the Bayes factors among the different priors and parameterizations exploited here. An ordering-agnostic prior would be represented by the case of parameterizations sampling over the two mass splittings and a mass scale, or those sampling over the individual neutrino masses via normal prior distributions only. In this regard, we show that the current significance in favor of the normal mass ordering should be taken as 2.7 sigma (i.e. moderate evidence), mostly driven by neutrino oscillation data. Let us stress that, while current data favor NO only mildly, we do not exclude the possibility that this may change in the future. Eventually, upcoming oscillation and cosmological data may (or may not) lead to a more significant exclusion of IO.
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