Abstract: In recent years, several observables associated to semileptonic b -> s processes have been found to depart from their predicted values in the Standard Model, including a few tantalizing hints of lepton flavor universality violation. In this work, we consider an existing model with a massive Z' boson that addresses the anomalies in b -> s transitions and extend it with a nontrivial embedding of neutrino masses. We analyze lepton flavor-violating effects, induced by the nonuniversal interaction associated to the b -> s anomalies and by the new physics associated to the neutrino mass generation, and determine the expected ranges for the most relevant observables.

Abstract: We present a new mechanism of baryogenesis and dark matter production in which both the dark matter relic abundance and the baryon asymmetry arise from neutral B meson oscillations and subsequent decays. This setup is testable at hadron colliders and B factories. In the early universe, decays of a long lived particle produce B mesons and antimesons out of thermal equilibrium. These mesons/antimesons then undergo CP violating oscillations before quickly decaying into visible and dark sector particles. Dark matter will be charged under the baryon number so that the visible sector baryon asymmetry is produced without violating the total baryon number of the Universe. The produced baryon asymmetry will be directly related to the leptonic charge asymmetry in neutral B decays: an experimental observable. Dark matter is stabilized by an unbroken discrete symmetry, and proton decay is simply evaded by kinematics. We will illustrate this mechanism with a model that is unconstrained by dinucleon decay, does not require a high reheat temperature, and would have unique experimental signals-a positive leptonic asymmetry in B meson decays, a new decay of B mesons into a baryon and missing energy, and a new decay of b-flavored baryons into mesons and missing energy. These three observables are testable at current and upcoming collider experiments, allowing for a distinct probe of this mechanism.

Abstract: A class of hybrid compact star equations of state is investigated that joins by a Maxwell construction a low-density phase of hadronic matter, modeled by a relativistic mean-field approach with excluded nucleon volume, with a high-density phase of color superconducting two-flavor quark matter, described within a nonlocal covariant chiral quark model. It is found that the occurrence of a stable branch of hybrid compact stars requires a nonvanishing vector meson coupling in the quark model that exceeds a minimal value which depends on the presence of a diquark condensate. It is shown that these hybrid stars do not form a third family disconnected from the second family of ordinary neutron stars unless additional (de) confining effects are introduced with a density-dependent bag pressure. A suitably chosen density dependence of the vector meson coupling assures that at the same time the 2M(circle dot) maximum mass constraint is fulfilled on the hybrid star branch. A twofold interpolation method is realized which implements both the density dependence of a confining bag pressure at the onset of the hadron-to-quark matter transition and the stiffening of quark matter at higher densities by a density-dependent vector meson coupling. For three parametrizations of this class of hybrid equation of state the properties of corresponding compact star sequences are presented, including mass twins of neutron and hybrid stars at 2.00, 1.39 and 1.20 M-circle dot, respectively, and the hybrid compact star (third) families. The sensitivity of the hybrid equation of state and the corresponding compact star sequences to variations of the interpolation parameters at the 10% level is investigated and it is found that the feature of third family solutions for compact stars is robust against such a variation. This advanced description of hybrid star matter allows us to interpret GW170817 as a merger not only of two neutron stars but also of a neutron star with a hybrid star or of two hybrid stars.

Abstract: Recently Gligorov et al. [V. V. Gligorov et al., Phys. Rev. D 99, 015023 (2019)] proposed to build a cylindrical detector named AL3X close to the ALICE experiment at interaction point (IP) 2 of the LHC, aiming for discovery of long-lived particles (LLPs) during Run 5 of the HL-LHC. We investigate the potential sensitivity reach of this detector in the parameter space of different new-physics models with long-lived fermions namely heavy neutral leptons (HNLs) and light supersymmetric neutralinos, which have both not previously been studied in this context. Our results show that the AL3X reach can be complementary or superior to that of other proposed detectors such as CODEX-b, FASER, MATHUSLA and SHiP.

Abstract: The fragmentation of high-energy gluons at small opening angles is largely unconstrained by present measurements. Gluon splitting to b-quark pairs is a unique probe into the properties of gluon fragmentation because identified b-tagged jets provide a proxy for the quark daughters of the initial gluon. In this study, key differential distributions related to the g -> b (b) over bar process are measured using 33 fb(-1) of root s = 13 TeV pp collision data recorded by the ATLAS experiment at the LHC in 2016. Jets constructed from charged-particle tracks, clustered with the anti-k(t) jet algorithm with radius parameter R = 0.2, are used to probe angular scales below the R = 0.4 jet radius. The observables are unfolded to particle level in order to facilitate direct comparisons with predictions from present and future simulations. Multiple significant differences are observed between the data and parton shower Monte Carlo predictions, providing input to improve these predictions of the main source of background events in analyses involving boosted Higgs bosons decaying into b-quarks.