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NEXT Collaboration(Fernandes, A. F. M. et al), Alvarez, V., Benlloch-Rodriguez, J. M., Carcel, S., Carrion, J. V., Diaz, J., et al. (2020). Low-diffusion Xe-He gas mixtures for rare-event detection: electroluminescence yield. J. High Energy Phys., 04(4), 034–18pp.
Abstract: High pressure xenon Time Projection Chambers (TPC) based on secondary scintillation (electroluminescence) signal amplification are being proposed for rare event detection such as directional dark matter, double electron capture and double beta decay detection. The discrimination of the rare event through the topological signature of primary ionisation trails is a major asset for this type of TPC when compared to single liquid or double-phase TPCs, limited mainly by the high electron diffusion in pure xenon. Helium admixtures with xenon can be an attractive solution to reduce the electron diffu- sion significantly, improving the discrimination efficiency of these optical TPCs. We have measured the electroluminescence (EL) yield of Xe-He mixtures, in the range of 0 to 30% He and demonstrated the small impact on the EL yield of the addition of helium to pure xenon. For a typical reduced electric field of 2.5 kV/cm/bar in the EL region, the EL yield is lowered by similar to 2%, 3%, 6% and 10% for 10%, 15%, 20% and 30% of helium concentration, respectively. This decrease is less than what has been obtained from the most recent simulation framework in the literature. The impact of the addition of helium on EL statistical fluctuations is negligible, within the experimental uncertainties. The present results are an important benchmark for the simulation tools to be applied to future optical TPCs based on Xe-He mixtures.
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Wimmer, K. et al, Algora, A., & Rubio, B. (2019). Discovery of Br-68 in secondary reactions of radioactive beams. Phys. Lett. B, 795, 266–270.
Abstract: The proton-rich isotope Br-68 was discovered in secondary fragmentation reactions of fast radioactive beams. Proton-rich secondary beams of (70,71,72) Kr and Br-70, produced at the RIKEN Nishina Center and identified by the BigRIPS fragment separator, impinged on a secondary Be-9 target. Unambiguous particle identification behind the secondary target was achieved with the ZeroDegree spectrometer. Based on the expected direct production cross sections from neighboring isotopes, the lifetime of the ground or long-lived isomeric state of Br-68 was estimated. The results suggest that secondary fragmentation reactions, where relatively few nucleons are removed from the projectile, offer an alternative way to search for new isotopes, as these reactions populate preferentially low-lying states.
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Afonso, V. I., Olmo, G. J., Orazi, E., & Rubiera-Garcia, D. (2019). New scalar compact objects in Ricci-based gravity theories. J. Cosmol. Astropart. Phys., 12(12), 044–20pp.
Abstract: Taking advantage of a previously developed method, which allows to map solutions of General Relativity into a broad family of theories of gravity based on the Ricci tensor (Ricci-based gravities), we find new exact analytical scalar field solutions by mapping the free-field static, spherically symmetric solution of General Relativity (GR) into quadratic f(R) gravity and the Eddington-inspired Born-Infeld gravity. The obtained solutions have some distinctive feature below the would-be Schwarzschild radius of a configuration with the same mass, though in this case no horizon is present. The compact objects found include wormholes, compact balls, shells of energy with no interior, and a new kind of object which acts as a kind of wormhole membrane. The latter object has Euclidean topology but connects antipodal points of its surface by transferring particles and null rays across its interior in virtually zero affine time. We point out the relevance of these results regarding the existence of compact scalar field objects beyond General Relativity that may effectively act as black hole mimickers.
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Olmo, G. J., Rubiera-Garcia, D., & Wojnar, A. (2019). Minimum main sequence mass in quadratic Palatini f(R) gravity. Phys. Rev. D, 100(4), 044020–9pp.
Abstract: General relativity yields an analytical prediction of a minimum required mass of roughly similar to 0.08-0.09 M-circle dot for a star to stably burn sufficient hydrogen to fully compensate photospheric losses and, therefore, to belong to the main sequence. Those objects below this threshold ( brown dwarfs) eventually cool down without any chance to stabilize their internal temperature. In this work we consider quadratic Palatini f(R) gravity and show that the corresponding Newtonian hydrostatic equilibrium equation contains a new term whose effect is to introduce a weakening/strengthening of the gravitational interaction inside astrophysical bodies. This fact modifies the general relativity prediction for this minimum main sequence mass. Through a crude analytical modeling we use this result in order to constraint a combination of the quadratic f(R) gravity parameter and the central density according to astrophysical observations.
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Delhom, A., Lobo, I. P., Olmo, G. J., & Romero, C. (2019). A generalized Weyl structure with arbitrary non-metricity. Eur. Phys. J. C, 79(10), 878–9pp.
Abstract: A Weyl structure is usually defined by an equivalence class of pairs (g, omega) related by Weyl transformations, which preserve the relation del g = omega circle times g, where g and omega denote the metric tensor and a 1-form field. An equivalent way of defining such a structure is as an equivalence class of conformally related metrics with a unique affine connection Gamma((omega)), which is invariant under Weyl transformations. In a standard Weyl structure, this unique connection is assumed to be torsion-free and have vectorial non-metricity. This second view allows us to present two different generalizations of standard Weyl structures. The first one relies on conformal symmetry while allowing for a general non-metricity tensor, and the other comes from extending the symmetry to arbitrary (disformal) transformations of the metric.
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ATLAS Collaboration(Aad, G. et al), Alvarez Piqueras, D., Aparisi Pozo, J. A., Bailey, A. J., Cabrera Urban, S., Castillo, F. L., et al. (2019). Search for a heavy charged boson in events with a charged lepton and missing transverse momentum from pp collisions at root s=13 TeV with the ATLAS detector. Phys. Rev. D, 100(5), 052013–29pp.
Abstract: A search for a heavy charged-boson resonance decaying into a charged lepton (electron or muon) and a neutrino is reported. A data sample of 139 fb(-1) of proton-proton collisions at root s = 13 TeV collected with the ATLAS detector at the LHC during 2015-2018 is used in the search. The observed transverse mass distribution computed from the lepton and missing transverse momenta is consistent with the distribution expected from the Standard Model, and upper limits on the cross section for pp -> W'-> lv are extracted (l = e or mu). These vary between 1.3 pb and 0.05 tb depending on the resonance mass in the range between 0.15 and 7.0 TeV at 95% confidence level for the electron and muon channels combined. Gauge bosons with a mass below 6.0 and 5.1 TeV are excluded in the electron and muon channels, respectively, in a model with a resonance that has couplings to fermions identical to those of the Standard Model W boson. Cross-section limits are also provided for resonances with several fixed Gamma/m values in the range between 1% and 15%. Model-independent limits are derived in single-bin signal regions defined by a varying minimum transverse mass threshold. The resulting visible cross-section upper limits range between 4.6 (15) ph and 22 (22) ab as the threshold increases from 130 (110) GeV to 5.1 (5.1) TeV in the electron (muon) channel.
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Sobczyk, J. E., Rocco, N., & Nieves, J. (2019). Polarization of tau in quasielastic (anti)neutrino scattering: The role of spectral functions. Phys. Rev. C, 100(3), 035501–14pp.
Abstract: We present a study of the tau polarization in charged-current quasielastic (anti)neutrino-nucleus scattering. The spectral function formalism is used to compute the differential cross section and the polarization components for several kinematical setups, relevant for neutrino-oscillation experiments. The effects of the nuclear corrections in these observables are investigated by comparing the results obtained using two different realistic spectral functions, with those deduced from the relativistic global Fermi gas model, where only statistical correlations are accounted for. We show that the spectral functions, although they play an important role when predicting the differential cross sections, produce much less visible effects on the polarization components of the outgoing tau.
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Delhom, A., Macedo, C. F. B., Olmo, G. J., & Crispino, L. C. B. (2019). Absorption by black hole remnants in metric-affine gravity. Phys. Rev. D, 100(2), 024016–12pp.
Abstract: Using numerical methods, we investigate the absorption properties of a family of nonsingular solutions which arise in different metric-affine theories, such as quadratic and Born-Infeld gravity. These solutions continuously interpolate between Schwarzschild black holes and naked solitons with wormhole topology. The resulting spectrum is characterized by a series of quasibound states excitations, associated with the existence of a stable photonsphere.
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Rafi Alam, M., & Ruiz Simo, I. (2019). Weak production of strange Xi baryons off the nucleon. Phys. Rev. D, 100(3), 033001–10pp.
Abstract: The charged current Cabibbo-suppressed associated K Xi production off the nucleon induced by antineutrinos is studied at low and intermediate energies. The nonresonant terms are obtained using a microscopical model based on the SU( 3) chiral Lagrangian. The basic parameters of the model are f(pi), the pion decay constant, Cabibbo's angle, the proton and neutron magnetic moments, and the axial vector coupling constants for the baryons octet, D and F, that are obtained from the analysis of the semileptonic decays of neutron and hyperons. In addition, we also consider Sigma(*)(1385) resonance, which can decay in K Xi final state when this channel is open. The studied mechanism is the prime source of Xi production at antineutrino energies around 2 GeV and the calculated cross sections at these energies can be measured at the current and future neutrino experiments.
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Mena, O., Palomares-Ruiz, S., Villanueva-Domingo, P., & Witte, S. J. (2019). Constraining the primordial black hole abundance with 21-cm cosmology. Phys. Rev. D, 100(4), 043540–23pp.
Abstract: The discoveries of a number of binary black hole mergers by LIGO and VIRGO have reinvigorated the interest that primordial black holes (PBHs) of tens of solar masses could contribute non-negligibly to the dark matter energy density. Should even a small population of PBHs with masses greater than or similar to O(M-circle dot) exist, they could profoundly impact the properties of the intergalactic medium and provide insight into novel processes at work in the early Universe. We demonstrate here that observations of the 21-cm transition in neutral hydrogen during the epochs of reionization and cosmic dawn will likely provide one of the most stringent tests of solar mass PBHs. In the context of 21-cm cosmology, PBHs give rise to three distinct observable effects: (i) the modification to the primordial power spectrum (and thus also the halo mass function) induced by Poisson noise, (ii) a uniform heating and ionization of the intergalactic medium via x-rays produced during accretion, and (iii) a local modification to the temperature and density of the ambient medium surrounding isolated PBHs. Using a four-parameter astrophysical model, we show that experiments like SKA and HERA could potentially improve upon existing constraints derived using observations of the cosmic microwave background by more than 1 order of magnitude.
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