Abstract: We construct an axially symmetric solution of Eddington-inspired Born-Infeld gravity coupled to an electromagnetic field in 2 + 1 dimensions including a (negative) cosmological constant term. This is achieved by using a recently developed mapping procedure that allows to generate solutions in certain families of metric-affine gravity theories starting from a known seed solution of General Relativity, which in the present case corresponds to the electrically charged Banados-Teitelboim-Zanelli (BTZ) solution. We discuss the main features of the new configurations, including the modifications to the ergospheres and horizons, the emergence of wormhole structures, and the consequences for the regularity (or not) of these space-times via geodesic completeness.

Abstract: We study a general class of gravitational theories formulated in the Palatini approach and derive the equations governing the evolution of tensor perturbations. In the absence of torsion, the connection can be solved as the Christoffel symbols of an auxiliary metric which is non-trivially related to the space-time metric. We then consider background solutions corresponding to a perfect fluid and show that the tensor perturbations equations (including anisotropic stresses) for the auxiliary metric around such a background take an Einstein-like form. This facilitates the study in a homogeneous and isotropic cosmological scenario where we explicitly establish the relation between the auxiliary metric and the spacetime metric tensor perturbations. As a general result, we show that both tensor perturbations coincide in the absence of anisotropic stresses.

Abstract: An amplitude analysis of B-0 ((+-))(K+-) decays is performed in the two-body invariant mass regions 300 < m((+-)) < 1100 MeV/c(2), accounting for the (0), , f(0)(500), f(0)(980) and f(0)(1370) resonances, and 750 < m(K+-) < 1200 MeV/c(2), which is dominated by the K-*(892)(0) meson. The analysis uses 3 fb(-1) of proton-proton collision data collected by the LHCb experiment at centre-of-mass energies of 7 and 8 TeV. The CP averages and asymmetries are measured for the magnitudes and phase differences of the con- tributing amplitudes. The CP-averaged longitudinal polarisation fractions of the vector-vector modes are found to be fK*0 = 0.164 +/- 0.015 +/- 0.022 and fK*0 = 0.68 +/- 0.17 +/- 0.16, and their CP asymmetries, AK*0 = -0.62 +/- 0.09 +/- 0.09 and AK*0 = -0.13 +/- 0.27 +/- 0.13, where the first uncertainty is statistical and the second systematic.

Abstract: The evolution of the universe prior to Big Bang Nucleosynthesis could have gone through a phase of early matter domination which enhanced the growth of small-scale dark matter structure. If this period was long enough, self-gravitating objects formed prior to reheating. We study the evolution of these dense early halos through reheating. At the end of early matter domination, the early halos undergo rapid expansion and eventually eject their matter. We find that this process washes out structure on scales much larger than naively expected from the size of the original halos. We compute the density profiles of the early halo remnants and use them to construct late-time power spectra that include these non-linear effects. We evolve the resulting power spectrum to estimate the properties of microhalos that would form after matter-radiation equality. Surprisingly, cosmologies with a short period of early matter domination lead to an earlier onset of microhalo formation compared to those with a long period. In either case, dark matter structure formation begins much earlier than in the standard cosmology, with most dark matter bound in microhalos in the late universe.

Abstract: We study the d(2)Gamma(d)/(d omega d cos theta(d) ), d Gamma(d)/d cos theta(d) and d Gamma(d)/dE(d) distributions, which are defined in terms of the visible energy and polar angle of the charged particle from the tau-decay in b -> C tau (mu(nu) over bar (mu)nu(tau), pi nu(tau), rho nu(tau))(nu) over bar (tau), reactions. These differential decay widths could be measured in the near future with certain precision. The first two contain information on the transverse tau-spin, tau-angular and tau-angular-spin asymmetries of the H-b -> H-c tau(nu) over bar (tau) parent decay and, from a dynamical point of view, they are richer than the commonly used one, d(2)Gamma(d)/(d omega dE(d)), since the latter only depends on the tau longitudinal polarization. We pay attention to the deviations with respect to the predictions of the standard model (SM) for these new observables, considering new physics (NP) operators constructed using both right- and left-handed neutrino fields, within an effective field-theory approach. We present results for Lambda(b) -> Lambda(c)tau (mu(nu) over bar (mu)nu(tau), pi nu(tau), rho nu(tau))(nu) over bar (tau) and (B) over bar -> D-(*()) tau (mu(nu) over bar (mu)nu(tau), pi nu(tau), rho nu(tau))(nu) over bar (tau) sequential decays and discuss their use to disentangle between different NP models. In this respect, we show that d Gamma(d)/d cos theta(d) , which should be measured with sufficiently good statistics, becomes quite useful, especially in the tau -> pi nu(tau) mode. The study carried out in this work could be of special relevance due to the recent LHCb measurement of the lepton flavor universality ratio R Lambda(c) in agreement with the SM. The experiment identified the tau using its hadron decay into pi(-)pi(+)pi(-)nu(tau), and this result for R Lambda(c )which is in conflict with the phenomenology from the b-meson sector, needs confirmation from other tau reconstruction channels.