Search

We perform an updated analysis on a long-lived axion domain wall (DW) network. By simulating the axion field on a 3D lattice and fitting an analytical model for the DW evolution, we identify the leading energy loss mechanisms of the DWs and compute the spectrum of axions emitted from the network. The contribution from the DWs to axion dark matter (DM) density is derived, with viable parameter space given. The application to both QCD axions and general axion-like particles (ALPs) are considered. Due to the new approaches taken, while our results bear consistency with earlier literature, notable discrepancies are also revealed, such as the prediction for DM abundance, which may have a profound impact on axion phenomenology at large., Comment: 19 pages, 25 figures

We demonstrate that enhanced early galaxy formation can generically arise in axion-like particle (ALP) dark matter (DM) models with a delayed onset of axion field oscillation. In these models, the formation of localized massive objects enhances structure formation, potentially addressing the excess recently observed by the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), while remaining consistent with existing constraints. We identify viable parameter space with the ALP mass in the range of $10^{-22}~{\rm eV}

The Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA) has two scientific objectives of cosmological focus: to probe the expansion rate of the universe, and to understand stochastic gravitational-wave backgrounds and their implications for early universe and particle physics, from the MeV to the Planck scale. However, the range of potential cosmological applications of gravitational wave observations extends well beyond these two objectives. This publication presents a summary of the state of the art in LISA cosmology, theory and methods, and identifies new opportunities to use gravitational wave observations by LISA to probe the universe.

Early dark energy that relieves Hubble tension leaves a fingerprint in the primordial stochastic gravitational wave (GW) background that originates from cosmic string network. The signal is not only detectable with future planned GW experiments, but also distinguishable from other astrophysical and cosmological signals in the GW frequency spectrum. We find that the cosmic string GW spectrum can probe other new physics that influence the universe in post-Big-Bang-Nucleosynthesis with mid-band GW detection, which extends GW cosmic archaeology search region., Comment: 12 pages, 6 figures, typo correction, new analysis plot, appendix with more details

Global cosmic strings are predicted in many motivated extensions to the Standard Model of particle physics, with close connections to axion dark matter physics. Recent studies suggest that, although subdominant relative to Goldstone emission, gravitational wave (GW) signals from global strings can be detectable with current and planned GW detectors such as LIGO, LISA, DECIGO/BBO, ET/CE and AEDGE/AION, as well as pulsar timing arrays such as PPTA, NANOGrav and SKA. This work is an extensive, updated study on GWs from a global cosmic string network, taking into account of the most recent developments related to the subject. The main analysis is based on the analytical Velocity-dependent One-Scale (VOS) model calibrated with recent simulation results, which provides a generic protocol for such calculations with details given. We also demonstrate how the GW signal can be influenced with variations to the baseline model: this includes considering the uncertainties of model parameters and the potential deviation from the conventional VOS model prediction (i.e. the scaling behavior) as suggested by some of the recent simulation results. Furthermore, we investigated in detail the effect of a non-standard cosmology (e.g. early matter domination or kination) or new particle species on the GW signals from global strings. We demonstrate that the frequency spectrum of GW background from global cosmic strings can be used to probe the cosmic history prior to the Big Bang nucleosynthesis (BBN) (i.e. the primordial dark age) up to a temperature of $T\sim 10^8$ GeV., Comment: 34 pages, 16 figures, JHEP published version

A zero initial velocity of the axion field is assumed in the conventional misalignment mechanism. We propose an alternative scenario where the initial velocity is nonzero, which may arise from an explicit breaking of the PQ symmetry in the early Universe. We demonstrate that, depending on the specifics about the initial velocity and the time order of the PQ symmetry breaking vs. inflation, this new scenario can alter the conventional prediction for the axion relic abundance in different, potentially significant ways. As a result, new viable parameter regions for axion dark matter may open up., Comment: 7 pages, 7 figures; UPDATE to a published version

Global cosmic strings are generically predicted in particle physics beyond the Standard Model, e.g., a post-inflationary global $U(1)$ symmetry breaking which may associate with axion-like dark matter. We demonstrate that although subdominant to Goldstone emission, gravitational waves (GWs) radiated from global strings can be observable with current or future GW detectors. The frequency spectrum of such GWs is also shown to be a powerful tool to probe the Hubble expansion rate of the Universe at times prior to the Big Bang nucleosynthesis where the standard cosmology has yet to be tested., Comment: Journal version, 9 pages, 6 figures

In the $SU(3)_C \times SU(2)_L \times SU(2)_R \times U(1)_{(B-L)/2}$ extension of the standard model, a minimal (but asymmetric) scalar sector consists of one $SU(2)_R \times U(1)_{(B-L)/2}$ doublet and one $SU(2)_L \times SU(2)_R$ bidoublet. Previous and recent studies have shown that this choice is useful for understanding neutrino mass as well as dark matter. The constraints from flavor changing neutral currents mediated by the scalar sector are discussed in the context of the latest experimental data.

We study an economical model of weakly-interacting massive particle dark matter (DM) which has spin 3/2 and interacts with the 125-GeV Higgs boson via effective scalar and pseudoscalar operators. We apply constraints on the model from the relic density data, LHC measurements of the Higgs boson, and direct and indirect searches for DM, taking into account the effective nature of the DM-Higgs couplings. We show that this DM is currently viable in most of the mass region from about 58 GeV to 2.3 TeV and will be probed more stringently by ongoing and upcoming experiments. Nevertheless, the presence of the DM-Higgs pseudoscalar coupling could make parts of the model parameter space elusive from future tests. We find that important aspects of this scenario are quite similar to those of its more popular spin-1/2 counterpart., Comment: 13 pages, 3 figures, somewhat expanded, references added, matches publication

The electric dipole moment of the electron is studied in detail in an extended mirror fermion model with the following unique features of (a) right-handed neutrinos are non-sterile and have masses at the electroweak scale, and (b) a horizontal symmetry of the tetrahedral group is used in the lepton and scalar sectors. We study the constraint on the parameter space of the model imposed by the latest ACME experimental limit on electron electric dipole moment. Other low energy experimental observables such as the anomalous magnetic dipole moment of the muon, charged lepton flavor violating processes like muon decays into electron plus photon and muon-to-electron conversion in titanium, gold and lead are also considered in our analysis for comparison. In addition to the well-known CP violating Dirac and Majorana phases in the neutrino mixing matrix, the dependence of additional phases of the new Yukawa couplings in the model is studied in detail for all these low energy observables., Comment: 27 pages, 6 figures, 1 table, and 1 appendix. Version to appear in NPB

We explore simple Higgs-portal models of dark matter (DM) with spin 1/2, 3/2, and 1, respectively, applying to them constraints from the LUX and PandaX-II direct detection experiments and from LHC measurements on the 125-GeV Higgs boson. With only one Higgs doublet, we find that the spin-1/2 DM having a purely scalar effective coupling to the doublet is viable only in a narrow range of mass near the Higgs pole, whereas the vector DM is still allowed if its mass is also close to the Higgs pole or exceeds 1.4 TeV, both in line with earlier analyses. Moreover, the spin-3/2 DM is in a roughly similar situation to the spin-1/2 DM, but has surviving parameter space which is even more restricted. We also consider the two-Higgs-doublet extension of each of the preceding models, assuming that the expanded Yukawa sector is that of the two-Higgs-doublet model of type II. We show that in these two-Higgs-doublet-portal models significant portions of the DM mass regions excluded in the simplest scenarios by direct search bounds can be reclaimed due to suppression of the effective DM interactions with nucleons at some ratios of the $CP$-even Higgs bosons' couplings to the up and down quarks. The regained parameter space contains areas which can yield a DM-nucleon scattering cross-section that is far less than its current experimental limit or even goes below the neutrino-background floor., Comment: 26 pages, 10 figures, somewhat expanded, references added, main conclusions unchanged, matches publication

We computed the contribution of the Compton and Bremsstrahlung processes with a hidden light $U(1)_D$ neutral boson $\gamma_D$ to the white dwarf G117-B15A anomalous cooling rate, as well as the white dwarf luminosity functions (WDLF). We demonstrated that for a light mass of hidden photon ($m_{\gamma_D} \ll$ a few keV), compatible results are obtained for the recent Sloan Digital Sky Survey and the SuperCOSMOS Sky Survey observation, but the stringent limits would be imposed on the kinetic mixing $\epsilon$. We performed $\chi^2$-tests to acquire a quantitative assessment on the WDLF data in the context of our model, computed under the assumption of different kinetic mixing $\epsilon$, the age of the oldest computed stars $T_D$, and a constant star formation rate $\psi$. Then taken together, the WDLF analysis of 2$\sigma$ confidence interval $\epsilon = \left( 0.37^{+0.35}_{-0.37}\right) \times 10^{-14}$ is barely consistent with the cooling rate analysis at 2$\sigma$ regime $\epsilon = \left( 0.97^{+0.35}_{-0.37} \right) \times 10^{-14}$. The two approaches used here agree with each other in yielding an anomalous cooling rate of white dwarf in this luminosity range., Comment: 17 pages, 4 figures

We perform the one-loop induced charged lepton flavor violating decays of the neutral Higgses in an extended mirror fermion model with non-sterile electroweak-scale right-handed neutrinos and a horizontal $A_4$ symmetry in the lepton sector. We demonstrate that for the 125 GeV scalar $h$ there is tension between the recent LHC result ${\cal B}(h \to \tau \mu) \sim $ 1% and the stringent limits on the rare processes $\mu \to e \gamma$ and $\tau \to (\mu$ or $e) \gamma$ from low energy experiments., Comment: 23 pages, 3 figures. Added some of reference

A large number of new experimental data on $B$ decay into two light pesudoscalar ($P$) mesons have been collected by the LHCb collaboration. Besides confirming information on $B_{u,d} \to PP$ decays obtained earlier by B-factories at KEK and SLAC, new information on $B_s\to PP$ and also more decay modes with $P$ being $\eta$ or $\eta'$ have been obtained. Using these new data, we perform a global fit for $B \to PP$ to determine decay amplitudes in the framework of $SU(3)/U(3)$ flavor symmetry. We find that $SU(3)$ flavor symmetry can explain data well. The annihilation amplitudes are found to be small as expected. Several CP violating relations predicted by $SU(3)$ flavor symmetry are in good agreement with data. Current available data can give constraints on the amplitudes which induce $P = \eta,\;\eta'$ decays in the framework of $U(3)$ flavor symmetry, and can also determine the $\eta-\eta'$ mixing angle $\theta$ with $\theta = (-18.4\pm1.2)^\circ$. Several $B \to PP$ decay modes which have not been measured are predicted with branching ratios accessible at the LHCb. These decays can provide further tests for the framework of $SU(3)/U(3)$ flavor symmetry for $B$ decays., Comment: RevTex, 19 pages. Added a "Note added" and a reference

The U(1)_D gauge sector containing one dark Higgs boson h_D and one dark photon \gamma_D may be explored through the decays of the 126 GeV particle discovered at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), assumed here as the heavier mass eigenstate h_1 in the mixing of the standard model h with h_D. The various decays of h_1 to \gamma_D \gamma_D, h_2 h_2, h_2 \gamma_D \gamma_D and h_2 h_2 h_2 would yield multilepton final states through the mixing of \gamma_D with the photon and the decay h_2 \to \gamma_D \gamma_D, where h_2 is the lighter dark Higgs. Future searches for signals of multilepton jets at the LHC may reveal the existence of this possible dark sector governed simply by the original Abelian Higgs model., Comment: 20 pages, 9 figures, 2 tables. New section added for signals of multilepton jets at the LHC-14