Abstract: In this paper, we investigate the model-independent traversable wormholes from baryon acoustic oscillations. Firstly, we place the statistical constraints on the average dark energy equation of state Wav by only using BAO data. Subsequently, two specific wormhole solutions are obtained, i.e, the cases of the constant redshift function and a special choice for the shape function. For the first case, we analyze the traversabilities of the wormhole configuration, and for the second case, we find that one can construct theoretically a traversable wormhole with infinitesimal amounts of average null energy condition violating phantom fluid. Furthermore, we perform the stability analysis for the first case, and find that the stable equilibrium configurations may increase for increasing values of the throat radius of the wormhole in the cases of a positive and a negative surface energy density. It is worth noting that the obtained wormhole solutions are static and spherically symmetrical metric, and that we assume Wav to be a constant between different redshifts when placing constraints, hence, these wormhole solutions can be interpreted as stable and static phantom wormholes configurations at some certain redshift which lies in the range [0.32, 2.34].

Abstract: Primordial black holes (PBHs) as part of the dark matter (DM) would modify the evolution of large-scale structures and the thermal history of the universe. Future 21 cm forest observations, sensitive to small scales and the thermal state of the intergalactic medium (IGM), could probe the existence of such PBHs. In this article, we show that the shot noise isocurvature mode on small scales induced by the presence of PBHs can enhance the amount of low-mass halos, or minihalos, and thus, the number of 21 cm absorption lines. However, if the mass of PBHs is as large as M-PBH greater than or similar to 10 M-circle dot, with an abundant enough fraction of PBHs as DM, f(PBH), the IGM heating due to accretion on to the PBHs counteracts the enhancement due to the isocurvature mode, reducing the number of absorption lines instead. The concurrence of both effects imprints distinctive signatures on the number of absorbers, allowing the abundance of PBHs to be bound. We compute the prospects for constraining PBHs with future 21 cm forest observations, finding achievable competitive upper limits on the abundance as low as f(PBH) similar to 10(-3) at M-PBH = 100 M-circle dot, or even lower at larger masses, in regions of the parameter space unexplored by current probes. The impact of astrophysical X-ray sources on the IGM temperature is also studied, which could potentially weaken the bounds.

Abstract: The use of Compton cameras for medical imaging and its interest as a hadron therapy treatment monitoring has increased in the last decade with the development of silicon photomultipliers. MACACOp is a Compton camera prototype designed and assembled at the IRIS group of IFIC-Valencia. This Compton camera is based on monolithic Lanthanum (III) Bromide crystals and silicon photomultipliers, and employs the novel TOFPET2 ASIC as readout electronics. This system emerged as an alternative to MACACO II prototype, with the aim of improving its limited time resolution. To test the performance of the ASIC in a Compton camera setup, the prototype was characterized, both in laboratory and in-beam. A time resolution of 1.5 ns was obtained after time corrections, which improves greatly the performance of the MACACO II. Moreover, the results obtained at high photon energies demonstrate the ability of the system to obtain 1 mm displacements of the reconstructed spots. The results reinforce the potential of the system as a monitoring device for hadron therapy.