Abstract: In calculations of the elementary scalar spectra of spontaneously broken gauge theories there are a number of subtleties which, though it is often unnecessary to deal with them in the order-of-magnitude type of calculations, have to be taken into account if fully consistent results are sought for. Within the “canonical” effective-potential approach these are, for instance: the need to handle infinite series of nested commutators of derivatives of field-dependent mass matrices, the need to cope with spurious IR divergences emerging in the consistent leading-order approximation and, in particular, the need to account for the fine interplay between the renormalization effects in the one-and two-point Green functions which, indeed, is essential for the proper stable vacuum identification and, thus, for the correct interpretation of the results. In this note we illustrate some of these issues in the realm of the minimal Abelian Higgs model and two of its simplest extensions including extra heavy scalars in the spectrum in attempt to exemplify the key aspects of the usual “hierarchy problem” lore in a very specific and simple setting. We emphasize that, regardless of the omnipresent polynomial cut-off dependence in the one-loop corrections to the scalar two-point function, the physical Higgs boson mass is always governed by the associated symmetry-breaking VEV and, as such, it is generally as UV-robust as all other VEV-driven masses in the theory.

Abstract: We present a fast method for producing mock galaxy catalogues that can be used to compute the covariance of large-scale clustering measurements and test analysis techniques. Our method populates a second-order Lagrangian perturbation theory (2LPT) matter field, where we calibrate masses of dark matter haloes by detailed comparisons with N-body simulations. We demonstrate that the clustering of haloes is recovered at similar to 10 per cent accuracy. We populate haloes with mock galaxies using a halo occupation distribution (HOD) prescription, which has been calibrated to reproduce the clustering measurements on scales between 30 and 80 h(-1) Mpc. We compare the sample covariance matrix from our mocks with analytic estimates, and discuss differences. We have used this method to make catalogues corresponding to Data Release 9 of the Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey (BOSS), producing 600 mock catalogues of the 'CMASS' galaxy sample. These mocks have enabled detailed tests of methods and errors, and have formed an integral part of companion analyses of these galaxy data.

Abstract: This Letter presents the results of a search for a heavy particle decaying into an e(+/-)mu(+/-), e(+/-)tau(+/-), or mu(+/-)tau(+/-) final state in pp collisions at root s = 7 TeV. The data were recorded with the ATLAS detector at the LHC during 2011 and correspond to an integrated luminosity of 4.6 fb(-1). No significant excess above the Standard Model expectation is observed, and exclusions at 95% confidence level are placed on the cross section times branching ratio for the production of an R-parity-violating supersymmetric tau sneutrino. For a sneutrino mass of 500 (2000) GeV, the observed limits on the production cross section times branching ratio are 3.2 (1.4) fb, 42 (17) fb, and 40 (18) fb for the e mu, e tau, and μtau modes, respectively. These results considerably extend constraints from Tevatron experiments.