Abstract: We study the influence of lepton flavor asymmetries on the formation and the mass spectrum of primordial black holes. We estimate the detectability of their mergers with LIGO/Virgo and show that the currently published gravitational wave events may actually be described by a primordial black hole spectrum from nonzero asymmetries. We suggest to use gravitational-wave astronomy as a novel tool to probe how lepton flavor asymmetric the Universe has been before the onset of neutrino oscillations.

Abstract: We extend the notion of the Nieh-Yan invariant to generic metric-affine geometries, where both torsion and nonmetricity are taken into account. Notably, we show that the properties of projective invariance and topologicity can be independently accommodated by a suitable choice of the parameters featuring this new Nieh-Yan term. We then consider a special class of modified theories of gravity able to promote the Immirzi parameter to a dynamical scalar field coupled to the Nieh-Yan form, and we discuss in more detail the dynamics of the effective scalar tensor theory stemming from such a revised theoretical framework. We focus, in particular, on cosmological Bianchi I models and we derive classical solutions where the initial singularity is safely removed in favor of a big bounce, which is ultimately driven by the nonminimal coupling with the Immirzi field. These solutions, moreover, turn out to be characterized by finite time singularities, but we show that such critical points do not spoil the geodesic completeness and wave regularity of these spacetimes.

Abstract: We provide a generic framework to obtain stable dark matter along with naturally small Dirac neutrino masses generated at the loop level. This is achieved through the spontaneous breaking of the global U(1)(B-L) symmetry already present in the standard model. The U(1)(B-L) symmetry is broken down to a residual even Z(n) (n >= 4) subgroup. The residual Z(n) symmetry simultaneously guarantees dark matter stability and protects the Dirac nature of neutrinos. The U(1)(B-L) symmetry in our setup is anomaly free and can also be gauged in a straightforward way. Finally, we present an explicit example using our framework to show the idea in action.

Abstract: Even though jet substructure was not an original design consideration for the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) experiments, it has emerged as an essential tool for the current physics program. We examine the role of jet substructure on the motivation for and design of future energy Frontier colliders. In particular, we discuss the need for a vibrant theory and experimental research and development program to extend jet substructure physics into the new regimes probed by future colliders. Jet substructure has organically evolved with a close connection between theorists and experimentalists and has catalyzed exciting innovations in both communities. We expect such developments will play an important role in the future energy Frontier physics program.

Abstract: The framed standard model (FSM), constructed to explain the empirical mass and mixing patterns (including CP phases) of quarks and leptons, in which it has done quite well, gives otherwise the same result as the standard model (SM) in almost all areas in particle physics where the SM has been successfully applied, except for a few specified deviations such as the W mass and the g-2 of muons, that is, just where experiment is showing departures from what SM predicts. It predicts further the existence of a hidden sector of particles some of which may function as dark matter. In this paper, we first note that the above results involve, surprisingly, the FSM undergoing a vacuum transition (VTR1) at a scale of around 17MeV, where the vacuum expectation values of the colour framons (framed vectors promoted into fields) which are all nonzero above that scale acquire some vanishing components below it. This implies that the metric pertaining to these vanishing components would vanish also. Important consequences should then ensue, but these occur mostly in the unknown hidden sector where empirical confirmation is hard at present to come by, but they give small reflections in the standard sector, some of which may have already been seen. However, one notes that if, going off at a tangent, one imagines colour to be embedded, Kaluza-Klein (KK) fashion, into a higher-dimensional space-time, then this VTR1 would cause 2 of the compactified dimensions to collapse. This might mean then that when the universe cooled to the corresponding temperature of 1011 K when it was about 10-3 s old, this VTR1 collapse would cause the three spatial dimensions of the universe to expand to compensate. The resultant expansion is estimated, using FSM parameters previously determined from particle physics, to be capable, when extrapolated backwards in time, of bringing the present universe back inside the then horizon, solving thus formally the horizon problem. Besides, VTR1 being a global phenomenon in the FSM, it would switch on and off automatically and simultaneously over all space, thus requiring seemingly no additional strategy for a graceful exit. However, this scenario has not been checked for consistency with other properties of the universe and is to be taken thus not as a candidate solution of the horizon problem but only as an observation from particle physics which might be of interest to cosmologists and experts in the early universe. For particle physicists also, it might serve as an indicator for how relevant this VTR1 can be, even if the KK assumption is not made.