Abstract: A search for highly ionising, penetrating particles with electric charges from vertical bar q vertical bar = 2e to 6e is performed using the ATLAS detector at the CERN Large Hadron Collider. Proton-proton collision data taken at root s = 7 TeV during the 2011 running period, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 4.4 fb(-1), are analysed. No signal candidates are observed, and 95% confidence level cross-section upper limits are interpreted as mass-exclusion lower limits for a simplified Drell-Yan production model. In this model, masses are excluded from 50 GeV up to 430, 480, 490, 470 and 420 GeV for charges 2e, 3e, 4e, 5e and 6e, respectively. (c) 2013 CERN. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

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 time-dependent CP asymmetry in B-s(0) -> J/psi K+ K- decays is measured using pp collision data at root s = 7 TeV, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 1: 0 fb(-1), collected with the LHCb detector. The decay-time distribution is characterized by the decay widths Gamma(L) and Gamma(H) of the light and heavy mass eigenstates of the B-s(0) – (B) over barB(s)(0) system and by a CP-violating phase s. In a sample of 27 617 B-s(0) -> J/psi K+ K- decays, where the dominant contribution comes from B-s(0) -> J/psi K+ K- decays, these parameters are measured to be phi(s) = 0. 07 +/- 0.09(stat) +/- 0. 01(syst) rad, Gamma(s) equivalent to (Gamma(L) + Gamma(L))/2 = 0.663 +/- 0.005(stat) +/- 0.006(syst) ps(-1), and 0.006(syst) ps(-1), and Delta Gamma(s) equivalent to Gamma(L) – Gamma(L) = 0.100 +/- 0.016(stat) +/- 0.003(syst) ps(-1), corresponding to the single most precise determination of phi(s), Delta Gamma(s), and Gamma(s.). The result of performing a combined analysis with B-s(0) -> J/psi pi(+) pi(-) decays gives phi(s) = 0.01 +/- 0.07(stat) +/- 0.01(syst)rad, Gamma(s) = 0.661 +/- 0.004(stat) +/- 0.006(syst) ps(-1), and Delta Gamma(s) = 0.106 +/- 0.011(stat) +/- 0.007(syst) ps(-1). All measurements are in agreement with the Standard Model predictions.