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ATLAS Collaboration(Aaboud, M. et al), Alvarez Piqueras, D., Barranco Navarro, L., Cabrera Urban, S., Castillo Gimenez, V., Cerda Alberich, L., et al. (2017). Measurement of (WW +/-)-W-+/- vector-boson scattering and limits on anomalous quartic gauge couplings with the ATLAS detector. Phys. Rev. D, 96(1), 012007–34pp.
Abstract: This paper presents the extended results of measurements of (WW +/-)-W-+/- jj production and limits on anomalous quartic gauge couplings using 20.3 fb(-1) of proton-proton collision data at root s = 8 TeV recorded by the ATLAS detector at the Large Hadron Collider. Events with two leptons (e or mu) with the same electric charge and at least two jets are analyzed. Production cross sections are determined in two fiducial regions, with different sensitivities to the electroweak and strong production mechanisms. An additional fiducial region, particularly sensitive to anomalous quartic gauge coupling parameters alpha 4 and alpha 5, is introduced, which allows more stringent limits on these parameters compared to the previous ATLAS measurement.
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Aguilar, A. C., Cardona, J. C., Ferreira, M. N., & Papavassiliou, J. (2017). Non-Abelian Ball-Chiu vertex for arbitrary Euclidean momenta. Phys. Rev. D, 96(1), 014029–29pp.
Abstract: We determine the non-Abelian version of the four nontransverse form factors of the quark-gluon vertex, using exact expressions derived from the Slavnov-Taylor identity that this vertex satisfies. In addition to the quark and ghost propagators, a key ingredient of the present approach is the quark-ghost scattering kernel, which is computed within the one-loop dressed approximation. The vertex form factors obtained from this procedure are evaluated for arbitrary Euclidean momenta, and display features not captured by the well-known Ball-Chiu vertex, deduced from the Abelian (ghost-free) Ward identity. Particularly interesting in this analysis is the so-called soft-gluon limit, which, unlike other kinematic configurations considered, is especially sensitive to the approximations employed for the vertex entering in the quark-ghost scattering kernel, and may even be affected by a subtle numerical instability. As an elementary application of the results obtained, we evaluate and compare certain renormalization-point-independent combinations, which contribute to the interaction kernels appearing in the standard quark gap and Bethe-Salpeter equations. In doing so, even though all form factors of the quark-gluon vertex, and in particular the transverse ones which are unconstrained by our procedure, enter nontrivially in the aforementioned kernels, only the contribution of a single form factor, corresponding to the classical (tree-level) tensor, will be considered.
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Gariazzo, S., Escudero, M., Diamanti, R., & Mena, O. (2017). Cosmological searches for a noncold dark matter component. Phys. Rev. D, 96(4), 043501–11pp.
Abstract: We explore an extended cosmological scenario where the dark matter is an admixture of cold and additional noncold species. The mass and temperature of the noncold dark matter particles are extracted from a number of cosmological measurements. Among others, we consider tomographic weak lensing data and Milky Way dwarf satellite galaxy counts. We also study the potential of these scenarios in alleviating the existing tensions between local measurements and cosmic microwave background ( CMB) estimates of the S-8 parameter, with S-8 = sigma(8)root Omega(m), and of the Hubble constant H-0. In principle, a subdominant, noncold dark matter particle with a mass m(X) similar to keV, could achieve the goals above. However, the preferred ranges for its temperature and its mass are different when extracted from weak lensing observations and from Milky Way dwarf satellite galaxy counts, since these two measurements require suppressions of the matter power spectrum at different scales. Therefore, solving simultaneously the CMB-weak lensing tensions and the small scale crisis in the standard cold dark matter picture via only one noncold dark matter component seems to be challenging.
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van Beekveld, M., Beenakker, W., Caron, S., Peeters, R., & Ruiz de Austri, R. (2017). Supersymmetry with dark matter is still natural. Phys. Rev. D, 96(3), 035015–7pp.
Abstract: We identify the parameter regions of the phenomenological minimal supersymmetric standard model (pMSSM) with the minimal possible fine-tuning. We show that the fine-tuning of the pMSSM is not large, nor under pressure by LHC searches. Low sbottom, stop and gluino masses turn out to be less relevant for low fine-tuning than commonly assumed. We show a link between low fine-tuning and the dark matter relic density. Fine-tuning arguments point to models with a dark matter candidate yielding the correct dark matter relic density: a bino-higgsino particle with a mass of 35-155 GeV. Some of these candidates are compatible with recent hints seen in astrophysics experiments such as Fermi-LAT and AMS-02. We argue that upcoming direct search experiments, such as XENON1T, will test all of the most natural solutions in the next few years due to the sensitivity of these experiments on the spin-dependent WIMP-nucleon cross section.
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Celis, A., Fuentes-Martin, J., Vicente, A., & Virto, J. (2017). Gauge-invariant implications of the LHCb measurements on lepton-flavor nonuniversality. Phys. Rev. D, 96(3), 035026–8pp.
Abstract: We study the implications of the recent measurements of R-K and R-K* by the LHCb Collaboration. We do that by adopting a model-independent approach based on the Standard Model effective field theory (SMEFT), with the dominant new physics (NP) effects encoded in the coefficients of dimension-6 operators respecting the full Standard Model (SM) gauge symmetry. After providing simplified expressions for R-K and R-K*, we determine the implications of the recent LHCb results for these observables on the coefficients of the SMEFT operators at low and high energies. We also take into account all b -> sll data, which combined lead to effective NP scenarios with SM pulls in excess of 5 sigma. Thus, the operators discussed in this paper would be the first dimension-6 terms in the SM Lagrangian to be detected experimentally. Indirect constraints on these operators are also discussed. The results of this paper transcend the singularity of the present situation and set a standard for future analyses in b -> s transitions when the NP is assumed to lie above the electroweak scale.
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Lubicz, V., Melis, A., & Simula, S. (2017). Masses and decay constants of D-(s)* and B-(s)* mesons with N-f=2+1+1 twisted mass fermions. Phys. Rev. D, 96(3), 034524–10pp.
Abstract: We present a lattice calculation of the masses and decay constants of D-(s)* and B-(s)* mesons using the gauge configurations produced by the European Twisted Mass Collaboration (ETMC) with N-f=2+1+1 dynamical quarks at three values of the lattice spacing a similar to(0.06-0.09) fm. Pion masses are simulated in the range M-pi similar or equal to(210-450) MeV, while the strange and charm sea-quark masses are close to their physical values. We compute the ratios of vector to pseudoscalar masses and decay constants for various values of the heavy-quark mass mh in the range 0.7m(c)(phys) less than or similar to m(h) less than or similar to 3m(c)(phys). In order to reach the physical b-quark mass, we exploit the Heavy Quark Effective Theory prediction that, in the static limit of infinite heavy-quark mass, the considered ratios are equal to one. At the physical point our results are: M-D*/M-D=1.0769(79), M-D*(s)/M-Ds=1.0751(56), f(D)*/f(D)=1.078(36), f(D)*s/f(Ds)=1.087(20), M-B*/M-B=1.0078(15), M-B*(s)/M-Bs=1.0083(10), f(B)*/f(B)=0.958(22) and f(B)*s/f(Bs)=0.974(10). Combining them with the experimental values of the pseudoscalar meson masses (used as input to fix the quark masses) and the values of the pseudoscalar decay constants calculated by ETMC, we get: M-D*=2013(14) MeV, M-D*(s)=2116(11) MeV, f(D)*=223.5(8.4) MeV, f(D)*(s)=268.8(6.6) MeV, M-B*=5320.5(7.6) MeV, M-B*(s)=5411.36(5.3) MeV, f(B)*=185.9(7.2) MeV and f(B)*(s)=223.1(5.4) MeV.
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T2K Collaboration(Abe, K. et al), Cervera-Villanueva, A., & Novella, P. (2017). Measurement of (nu)over-bar(mu) and nu(mu) charged current inclusive cross sections and their ratio with the T2K off-axis near detector. Phys. Rev. D, 96(5), 052001–15pp.
Abstract: We report a measurement of cross section sigma(nu(mu) + nucleus. -> mu(-) + X) and the first measurements of the cross section sigma((sigma) over bar (mu) + nucleus -> mu(+) + X) and their ratio R(sigma((nu) over bar)sigma(nu)) at (anti) neutrino energies below 1.5 GeV. We determine the single momentum bin cross section measurements, averaged over the T2K (nu) over bar/nu-flux, for the detector target material (mainly carbon, oxygen, hydrogen and copper) with phase space restricted laboratory frame kinematics of theta(mu) < 32 degrees and p(mu) > 500 MeV/c. The results are sigma((nu) over bar) = (0.900 +/- 0.029d (stat) +/- 0.088(syst) x 10(-39) and sigma(nu) = (2.41 +/- 0.022(stat) +/- 0.231(syst)) x 10(-39) in units of cm(2)/nucleon and R(sigma((nu) over bar)/sigma(nu) = 0.373 +/- 0.012(stat) +/- 0.015(syst).
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Motohashi, H., & Hu, W. (2017). Primordial black holes and slow-roll violation. Phys. Rev. D, 96(6), 063503–9pp.
Abstract: For primordial black holes (PBH) to be the dark matter in single-field inflation, the slow-roll approximation must be violated by at least O(1) in order to enhance the curvature power spectrum within the required number of e-folds between cosmic microwave background scales and PBH mass scales. Power spectrum predictions which rely on the inflaton remaining on the slow-roll attractor can fail dramatically leading to qualitatively incorrect conclusions in models like an inflection potential and misestimate the mass scale in a running mass model. We show that an optimized temporal evaluation of the Hubble slow-roll parameters to second order remains a good description for a wide range of PBH formation models where up to a 10(7) amplification of power occurs in 10 e-folds or more.
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ANTARES Collaboration(Albert, A. et al), Barrios-Marti, J., Coleiro, A., Hernandez-Rey, J. J., Illuminati, G., Lotze, M., et al. (2017). New constraints on all flavor Galactic diffuse neutrino emission with the ANTARES telescope. Phys. Rev. D, 96(6), 062001–8pp.
Abstract: The flux of very high-energy neutrinos produced in our Galaxy by the interaction of accelerated cosmic rays with the interstellar medium is not yet determined. The characterization of this flux will shed light on Galactic accelerator features, gas distribution morphology and Galactic cosmic ray transport. The central Galactic plane can be the site of an enhanced neutrino production, thus leading to anisotropies in the extraterrestrial neutrino signal as measured by the IceCube Collaboration. The ANTARES neutrino telescope, located in the Mediterranean Sea, offers a favorable view of this part of the sky, thereby allowing for a contribution to the determination of this flux. The expected diffuse Galactic neutrino emission can be obtained, linking a model of generation and propagation of cosmic rays with the morphology of the gas distribution in the Milky Way. In this paper, the so-called “gamma model” introduced recently to explain the high-energy gamma-ray diffuse Galactic emission is assumed as reference. The neutrino flux predicted by the “gamma model” depends on the assumed primary cosmic ray spectrum cutoff. Considering a radially dependent diffusion coefficient, this proposed scenario is able to account for the local cosmic ray measurements, as well as for the Galactic gamma-ray observations. Nine years of ANTARES data are used in this work to search for a possible Galactic contribution according to this scenario. All flavor neutrino interactions are considered. No excess of events is observed, and an upper limit is set on the neutrino flux of 1.1 (1.2) times the prediction of the “gamma model,” assuming the primary cosmic ray spectrum cutoff at 5 (50) PeV. This limit excludes the diffuse Galactic neutrino emission as the major cause of the “spectral anomaly” between the two hemispheres measured by IceCube.
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Kosmas, T. S., Papoulias, D. K., Tortola, M., & Valle, J. W. F. (2017). Probing light sterile neutrino signatures at reactor and Spallation Neutron Source neutrino experiments. Phys. Rev. D, 96(6), 063013–12pp.
Abstract: We investigate the impact of a fourth sterile neutrino at reactor and Spallation Neutron Source neutrino detectors. Specifically, we explore the discovery potential of the TEXONO and COHERENT experiments to subleading sterile neutrino effects through the measurement of the coherent elastic neutrino-nucleus scattering event rate. Our dedicated chi(2)-sensitivity analysis employs realistic nuclear structure calculations adequate for high purity sub-keV threshold Germanium detectors.
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