Abstract: The nature of dark matter is one of the most thrilling riddles for both cosmology and particle physics nowadays. While in the typical models the dark sector is composed only by weakly interacting massive particles, an arguably more natural scenario would include a whole set of gauge interactions which are invisible for the standard model but that are in contact with the dark matter. We present a method to constrain the number of massless gauge bosons and other relativistic particles that might be present in the dark sector using current and future cosmic microwave background data, and provide upper bounds on the size of the dark sector. We use the fact that the dark matter abundance depends on the strength of the interactions with both sectors, which allows one to relate the freeze-out temperature of the dark matter with the temperature of this cosmic background of dark gauge bosons. This relation can then be used to calculate how sizable is the impact of the relativistic dark sector in the number of degrees of freedom of the early Universe, providing an interesting and testable connection between cosmological data and direct/indirect detection experiments. The recent Planck data, in combination with other cosmic microwave background experiments and baryonic acoustic oscillations data, constrains the number of relativistic dark gauge bosons, when the freeze-out temperature of the dark matter is larger than the top mass, to be N less than or similar to 14 for the simplest scenarios, while those limits are slightly relaxed for the combination with the Hubble constant measurements to N less than or similar to 20. Future releases of Planck data are expected to reduce the uncertainty by approximately a factor of 3, which will reduce significantly the parameter space of allowed models.

Abstract: An interesting mass relation between down-type quarks and charged leptons has been recently predicted within a supersymmetric SU(3)(c) circle times SU(2)(L) circle times U(1)(Y) model based on the A(4) flavor symmetry. Here we propose a simple extension which provides an adequate full description of the quark sector. By adding a pair of vectorlike up quarks, we show how the CKM entries V-ub, V-cb, V-td and V-ts arise from deviations of the unitarity. We perform an analysis including the most relevant observables in the quark sector, such as oscillations and rare decays of kaons, B-d and B-s mesons. In the lepton sector, the model predicts an inverted hierarchy for the neutrino masses, leading to a potentially observable rate of neutrinoless double beta decay.

Abstract: Among the newly observed structures in the heavy-quarkonium mass region, some have been proposed to be hadronic molecules. We investigate the consequences of heavy- quark flavor symmetry on these heavy meson hadronic molecules. The symmetry allows us to predict new hadronic molecules on one hand, and test the hadronic molecular assumption of the observed structures on the other hand. We explore the consequences of the flavor symmetry assuming the X(3872) and Z(b)(10 610) as an isoscalar D (D) over bar* and isovector B (B) over bar* hadronic molecule, respectively. A series of hadronic molecules composed of heavy mesons are predicted. In particular, there is an isoscalar 1(++) B (B) over bar* bound state with a mass about 10 580 MeV which may be searched for in the Y(1S, 2S)pi(+) pi(-) pi(0) mass distribution; the isovector charmonium partners of the Z(b)(10 610) and the Z(b)(10 650) are also predicted, which probably corresponds to the very recently observed Z(c)(3900) and Z(c)(4025) resonances by the BESIII Collaboration.

Abstract: We review and extend the model derived in Garcia-Recio et al. [Phys. Rev. D 83, 016007 (2011)] to address the dynamics of the low-lying even-parity meson resonances. This model is based on a coupled-channels spin-flavor extension of the chiralWeinberg-Tomozawa Lagrangian. This interaction is then used to study the S-wave meson-meson scattering involving members not only of the pi octet, but also of the rho nonet. In this work, we study in detail the structure of the SU(6)-symmetry-breaking contact terms that respect (or softly break) chiral symmetry. We derive the most general local (without involving derivatives) terms consistent with the chiral-symmetry-breaking pattern of QCD. After introducing sensible simplifications to reduce the large number of possible operators, we carry out a phenomenological discussion of the effects of these terms. We show how the inclusion of these pieces leads to an improvement of the description of the J(P) = 2(+) sector, without spoiling the main features of the predictions obtained in the original model in the JP = 0(+) and J(P) = 1(+) sectors. In particular, we find a significantly better description of the I-G(J(PC)) =0(+)(2(++)), 1(-)(2(++)) and the I(JP)=1/2(2(+)) sectors, which correspond to the f(2)(1270), a(2)(1320), and K-2(*)(1430) quantum numbers, respectively.

Abstract: In the present paper we address the interaction of pairs of charmed mesons with hidden charm in a finite box. We use the interaction from a recent model based on heavy-quark spin symmetry that predicts molecules of hidden charm in the infinite volume. The energy levels in the box are generated within this model, and from them some synthetic data are generated. These data are then employed to study the inverse problem of getting the energies of the bound states and phase shifts for D (D) over bar or D*(D) over bar*. Different strategies are investigated using the lowest two levels for different values of the box size, and the errors produced are studied. Starting from the upper level, fits to the synthetic data are carried out to determine the scattering length and effective range plus the binding energy of the ground state. A similar strategy using the effective range formula is considered with a simultaneous fit to the two levels-one above and the other one below the threshold. This method turns out to be more efficient than the previous one. Finally, a method based on the fit to the data by means of a potential and a conveniently regularized loop function, turns out to be very efficient and allows us to produce accurate results in the infinite volume starting from levels of the box with errors far larger than the uncertainties obtained in the final results. A regularization method based on Gaussian wave functions turns out to be rather efficient in the analysis and as a byproduct a practical and fast method to calculate the Luscher function with high precision is presented.