Abstract: The idea of a rank-one rotating mass matrix (R2M2) is reviewed detailing how it leads to ready explanations both for the fermion mass hierarchy and for the distinctive mixing patterns between up and down fermion states, which can be and have been tested against experiment and shown to be fully consistent with existing data. Further, R2M2 is seen to offer, as by-products: (i) a new solution to the strong CP problem in QCD by linking the theta-angle there to the Kobayashi-Maskawa CP-violating phase in the CKM matrix, and (ii) some novel predictions of possible anomalies in Higgs decay observable in principle at the LHC. A special effort is made to answer some questions raised.

Abstract: It is shown that if, from the starting point of a universal rank-one mass matrix long favored by phenomenologists, one adds the assumption that it rotates (changes its orientation in generation space) with changing scale, one can reproduce, in terms of only six real parameters, all the 16 mass ratios and mixing parameters of quarks and leptons. Of these 16 quantities so reproduced, 10 for which data exist for direct comparison (i.e. the CKM elements including the CP-violating phase, the angles theta(12), theta(13), theta(23) in nu-oscillation, and the masses m(c), m(mu), m(e)) agree well with experiment, mostly to within experimental errors; four others (m(s), m(u), m(d), m(nu 2)), the experimental values for which can only be inferred, agree reasonably well; while two others (m(nu 1), delta(CP) for leptons), not yet measured experimentally, remain as predictions. In addition, one gets as bonuses, estimates for (i) the right-handed neutrino mass m(nu R) and (ii) the strong CP angle theta inherent in QCD. One notes in particular that the output value for sin(2) 2 theta(13) from the fit agrees very well with recent experiments. By inputting the current experimental value with its error, one obtains further from the fit two new testable constraints: (i) that theta(23) must depart from its “maximal” value: sin(2) 2 theta(23) similar to 0.935 +/- 0.021, (ii) that the CP-violating (Dirac) phase in the PMNS would be smaller than in the CKM matrix: of order only vertical bar sin delta(CP)vertical bar <= 0.31 if not vanishing altogether.

Abstract: The framed standard model (FSM) is obtained from the standard model by incorporating, as field variables, the frame vectors (vielbeins) in internal symmetry space. It gives the standard Higgs boson and 3 generations of quarks and leptons as immediate consequences. It gives moreover a fermion mass matrix of the form: m = mT alpha alpha dagger, where alpha is a vector in generation space independent of the fermion species and rotating with changing scale, which has already been shown to lead, generically, to up-down mixing, neutrino oscillations and mass hierarchy. In this paper, pushing the FSM further, one first derives to 1-loop order the RGE for the rotation of alpha, and then applies it to fit mass and mixing data as a first test of the model. With 7 real adjustable parameters, 18 measured quantities are fitted, most (12) to within experimental error or to better than 0.5 percent, and the rest (6) not far off. (A summary of this fit can be found in Table 2 of this paper.) Two notable features, both generic to FSM, not just specific to the fit, are: (i) that a theta-angle of order unity in the instanton term in QCD would translate via rotation into a Kobayashi-Maskawa phase in the CKM matrix of about the observed magnitude (J similar to 10(-5)), (ii) that it would come out correctly that m(u) < m(d), despite the fact that m(t) >> m(b), m(c) >> m(s). Of the 18 quantities fitted, 12 are deemed independent in the usual formulation of the standard model. In fact, the fit gives a total of 17 independent parameters of the standard model, but 5 of these have not been measured by experiment.

Abstract: This closer study of the FSM (1) retains the earlier results of Ref. 1 in offering explanation for the existence of three fermion generations, as well as the hierarchical mass and mixing patterns of leptons and quarks; (II) predicts a vector boson G with mass of order TeV which mixes gamma with and Z of the standard model. The subsequent deviations from the standard mixing scheme are calculable in terms of the G mass. While these deviations for (i) mz – mw, (ii) Gamma(Z -> l (+)l( -)), and (iii) F(Z -> hadrons) are all within present experimental errors so long as mG > 1 TeV, they should soon be detectable if the G mass is not too much bigger; (III) suggests that in parallel to the standard sector familiar to us, there is another where the roles of flavour and colour are interchanged. Though quite as copiously populated and as vibrant in self-interactions as our own, it communicates but little with the standard sector except via mixing through a couple of known portals, one of which is the gamma – Z – G complex noted in (II), and the other is a scalar complex which includes the standard model Higgs. As a result, the new sectors paper. appears hidden to us as we appear hidden to them, and so its lowest members with masses of order 10 MeV, being electrically neutral and seemingly stable, but abundant, may make eligible candidates as constituents of dark matter. A more detailed summary of these results together with some remarks on the model's special theoretical features can be found in the last section of this paper.

Abstract: We present the result of a search for a massive color-octet vector particle, (e.g. a massive gluon) decaying to a pair of top quarks in proton-antiproton collisions with a center-of-mass energy of 1.96 TeV. This search is based on 1.9 fb(-1) of data collected using the CDF detector during Run II of the Tevatron at Fermilab. We study t (t) over bar events in the lepton + jets channel with at least one b-tagged jet. A massive gluon is characterized by its mass, decay width, and the strength of its coupling to quarks. These parameters are determined according to the observed invariant mass distribution of top quark pairs. We set limits on the massive gluon coupling strength for masses between 400 and 800 GeV/c(2) and width-to-mass ratios between 0.05 and 0.50. The coupling strength of the hypothetical massive gluon to quarks is consistent with zero within the explored parameter space.