Search

The exploration of the universe has recently entered a new era thanks to the multi-messenger paradigm, characterized by a continuous increase in the quantity and quality of experimental data that is obtained by the detection of the various cosmic messengers (photons, neutrinos, cosmic rays and gravitational waves) from numerous origins. They give us information about their sources in the universe and the properties of the intergalactic medium. Moreover, multi-messenger astronomy opens up the possibility to search for phenomenological signatures of quantum gravity. On the one hand, the most energetic events allow us to test our physical theories at energy regimes which are not directly accessible in accelerators; on the other hand, tiny effects in the propagation of very high energy particles could be amplified by cosmological distances. After decades of merely theoretical investigations, the possibility of obtaining phenomenological indications of Planck-scale effects is a revolutionary step in the quest for a quantum theory of gravity, but it requires cooperation between different communities of physicists (both theoretical and experimental). This review is aimed at promoting this cooperation by giving a state-of-the art account of the interdisciplinary expertise that is needed in the effective search of quantum gravity footprints in the production, propagation and detection of cosmic messengers., Comment: This review was written by participants of the COST Action CA18108. Further information on the review can be found at https://qg-mm.unizar.es/review/, updated to published version

The presence of massive sterile neutrinos $N$ mixed with the active ones induces flavor violating processes in the charged lepton sector at the loop level. In particular, the amplitude of $H^0\to \bar{\ell}_i\ell_j$ is expected to be proportional to the product of heavy-light Yukawa couplings $y_iy_j=2 \,s_{\nu_i} s_{\nu_j}\, m_N^2/v^2$, where $s_{\nu_{i,j}}$ express the heavy-light neutrino mixings. Here we revisit these Higgs decays in the most generic extension of the neutrino sector, focusing on large values of $y_{i}$. We show that decoupling effects and a cancellation between the two dominant contributions to these processes makes the amplitude about one hundred times smaller than anticipated. We find that perturbative values of $y_{i}$ giving an acceptable contribution to the $\rho$ parameter imply ${\cal B}(H^0\to \bar{\ell}_i\ell_j)<10^{-8}$ for any lepton flavors, a rate that is not accessible at current colliders., Comment: Comments and references added, version accepted for publication in PRD

The observation of lepton flavor violating processes at colliders could be a clear signal of a non-minimal neutrino sector. We define a 5-parameter model with a pair of TeV fermion singlets and arbitrary mixings with the three active neutrino flavors. Then we analyze several flavor violating transitions ($\ell\to \ell^{\prime}\gamma,\,\ell^{\prime}\ell^{\prime\prime}\bar{\ell}^{\prime\prime\prime}$ or $\mu-e$ conversions in nuclei) and $Z\to\bar{\ell}\,\ell^{\prime}$ decays induced by the presence of heavy neutrinos. In particular, we calculate all the one-loop contributions to these processes and present their analytic expressions. We focus on the genuine effects of the heavy Majorana masses, comparing the results in that case with the ones obtained when the two heavy neutrinos define a Dirac field. Finally, we use our results to update the bounds on the heavy-light mixings in the neutrino sector., Comment: Accepted for publication in PRD, discussions and references added; 13 pages, 7 figures

The Antarctic Impulsive Transient Antenna (ANITA) experiment has observed two air shower events with energy $\sim 500~{\rm PeV}$ emerging from the Earth with exit angles $\sim 30^\circ$ above the horizon. As was immediately noted by the ANITA Collaboration, these events (in principle) could originate in the atmospheric decay of an upgoing $\tau$-lepton produced through a charged current interaction of a $\nu_\tau$ inside the Earth. However, the relatively steep arrival angles of these perplexing events create tension with the standard model (SM) neutrino-nucleon interaction cross section. Deepening the conundrum, the IceCube neutrino telescope and the Pierre Auger Observatory with substantially larger exposures to cosmic $\nu_\tau$'s in this energy range have not observed any events. This lack of observation implies that the messenger particle (MP) giving rise to ANITA events must produce an air shower event rate at least a factor of 40 larger than that produced by a flux of $\tau$-neutrinos to avoid conflicts with the upper limits reported by the IceCube and the Pierre Auger collaborations. In addition, the sensitivity of ANITA to MP-induced events must be comparable to or larger than those of IceCube and Auger to avoid conflict with the non-observation of any signal at these facilities. Beyond SM interpretations of ANITA events can be classified according to whether the MPs: (i) live inside the Earth, (ii) originate in neutrino-nucleon collisions inside the Earth, (iii) come from cosmological distances. In this communication we investigate the positive and negative facets of these three classes of models., Comment: To appear in Proceedings of the 36th International Cosmic Ray Conference

We re-examine lepton flavor violation (LFV) in the Littlest Higgs model with T--parity (LHT) including the full T--odd (non-singlet) lepton and Goldstone sectors. The heavy leptons induce two independent sources of LFV associated with the couplings necessary to give masses to the T--odd mirror fermions and to their partners in right-handed $SO(5)$ multiplets, respectively. The latter, which have been neglected in the past, can be decoupled from gauge mediated processes but not from Higgs mediated ones and must therefore also be included in a general analysis of LFV in the LHT. We also further extend previous analyses by considering on-shell $Z$ and Higgs LFV decays together with the LFV processes at low momentum transfer. We show that current experimental limits can probe the LHT parameter space up to global symmetry breaking scales $f \sim 10$ TeV. For lower $f$ values $\gtrsim 1$ TeV, $\mu-e$ transitions require the misalignment between the heavy and the Standard Model charged leptons to be $\lesssim 1 \, \%$. Future LFV experiments using intense muon beams should be sensitive to misalignments below the per mille level. For $\tau$ LFV transitions, which could potentially be observed at Belle II and the LHC as well as future lepton colliders, we find that generically they can not discriminate between the LHT and supersymmetric models though in some regions of parameter space this may be possible., Comment: 50 pages, 11 figures. Enlarged phenomenological discussion. New figures and references added. v3: Matches published version, 45 pages, 12 figures

We calculate loop induced lepton flavor violating Higgs decays in the Littlest Higgs model with T-parity. We find that a finite amplitude is obtained only when all contributions from the T-odd lepton sector are included. This is in contrast to lepton flavor violating processes mediated by gauge bosons where the partners of the right-handed mirror leptons can be decoupled from the spectrum. These partners are necessary to cancel the divergence in the Higgs mass introduced by the mirror leptons but are otherwise unnecessary and assumed to be decoupled in previous phenomenological studies. Furthermore, as we emphasize, including the partner leptons in the spectrum also introduces a new source of lepton flavor violation via their couplings to the physical pseudo-Goldstone electroweak triplet scalar. Although this extra source also affects lepton flavor changing gauge transitions, it decouples from these amplitudes in the limit of heavy mass for the partner leptons. We find that the corresponding Higgs branching ratio into taus and muons can be as large as $\sim 0.2 \times 10^{-6}$ for T-odd masses of the order a few TeV, a demanding challenge even for the high luminosity LHC., Comment: 26 pages, 1 figure. Typos corrected

We discuss the spectrum of the different components in the astrophysical neutrino flux reaching the Earth and the possible contribution of each component to the high-energy IceCube data. We show that the diffuse flux from cosmic ray interactions with gas in our galaxy implies just 2 events among the 54 event sample. We argue that the neutrino flux from cosmic ray interactions in the intergalactic (intracluster) space depends critically on the transport parameter $\delta$ describing the energy dependence in the diffusion coefficient of galactic cosmic rays. Our analysis motivates a E^{-2.1} neutrino spectrum with a drop at PeV energies that fits well the data, including the non-observation of the Glashow resonance at 6.3 PeV. We also show that a cosmic ray flux described by an unbroken power law may produce a neutrino flux with interesting spectral features (bumps and breaks) related to changes in the cosmic ray composition., Comment: 19 pages, new section about changes in CR composition, version to appear in ApJ

We find that the ratio r_{mu e} of the muon to the electromagnetic component of an extended air shower at the ground level provides an indirect measure of the depth X_{max} of the shower maximum. This result, obtained with the air-shower code AIRES, is independent of the hadronic model used in the simulation. We show that the value of r_{mu e} in a particular shower discriminates its proton or iron nature with a 98% efficiency. We also show that the eventual production of forward heavy quarks inside the shower may introduce anomalous values of r_{mu e} in isolated events., Comment: 10 pages, version to appear in Astroparticle Physics

Very energetic charm and bottom hadrons may be produced in the upper atmosphere when a primary cosmic ray or the leading hadron in an extensive air shower collide with a nucleon. At $E\approx 10^8$ GeV their decay length becomes of the order of 10 km, implying that they tend to interact in the air instead of decaying. Since the inelasticity in these collisions is much smaller than the one in proton and pion collisions, there could be rare events where a heavy-hadron component transports a significant amount of energy deep into the atmosphere. We have developed a module for the detailed simulation of these processes and have included it in a new version of the air shower simulator AIRES. We study the frequency, the energy distribution and the depth of charm and bottom production, as well as the depth and the energy distribution of these quarks when they decay. As an illustration, we consider the production and decay of tau leptons (from $D_s$ decays) and the lepton flux at PeV energies from a 30 EeV proton primary. The proper inclusion of charm and bottom hadrons in AIRES opens the possibility to search for air-shower observables that are sensitive to heavy quark effects., Comment: Accepted for publication in Astroparticle Physics

We consider SUSY extensions of the standard model where the gravitino is the dark-matter particle and the stau is long lived. If there is a significant mass gap with squarks and gluinos, the staus produced at hadron colliders tend to be fast (beta>0.8), and the searches based on their delay in the time of flight or their anomalous ionization become less effective. Such staus would be identified as regular muons with the same linear momentum and a slightly reduced energy. Compared to the usual SUSY models where a neutralino is the LSP, this scenario implies (i) more leptons (the two staus at the end of the decay chains), (ii) a strong e-mu asymmetry, and (iii) less missing E_T (just from neutrinos, as the lightest neutralino decays into stau). We study the bounds on this SUSY from current LHC analyses (same-sign dileptons and multilepton events) and discuss the best strategy for its observation., Comment: 15 pages

Collisions of cosmic rays in the atmosphere may produce heavy hadrons of very high energy. The decay length of a $B$ meson of energy above $10^7$ GeV is larger than 1 km, implying that such a particle tends to interact in the air before it decays. We show that the fraction of energy deposited in these interactions is much smaller than in proton and pion collisions. We parameterize their elasticity and determine the average number of interactions and the atmospheric depth at the decay point for different initial energies. We find that the profile of a $3\times 10^9$ GeV bottom shower may be very different from the profile of a proton shower of the same energy, defining either a very deep maximum, or two maxima, or other features that cannot be parameterized with a single Gaisser-Hillas function. Finally, we discuss under what conditions a bottom hadron inside the parent air shower may provide observable effects., Comment: 13 pages, 8 figures

The flavor sector of Little Higgs models based on product groups, notably the Littlest Higgs with T parity (LHT), has been extensively studied and some amount of fine tuning was found to be required to meet the experimental constraints. However, no such attention has been paid to other classes of models. Here we analyze the phenomenology of flavor mixing in the lepton sector of a simple group model, the Simplest Little Higgs (SLH). We obtain the Feynman rules of the SLH in the 't Hooft-Feynman gauge up to the necessary order and calculate the leading contributions to the rare processes mu -> e gamma, mu -> eee and mu-e conversion in nuclei. We find results comparable to those of the LHT model, because in both cases they arise at the one-loop level. These require the flavor alignment of the Yukawa couplings of light and heavy leptons at the per cent level or an effective scale of around 10 TeV., Comment: 41 pages, 8 figures; minor changes and one reference added, version to appear in JHEP

The observation of astrophysical neutrinos requires a detailed understanding of the atmospheric neutrino background. Since neutrinos are produced in meson decays together with a charged lepton, important constraints on this background can be obtained from the measurement of the atmospheric muon flux. Muons, however, can also be produced as mu+ mu- pairs by purely electromagnetic processes. We use the Z-moment method to study and compare the contributions to the atmospheric muon and neutrino fluxes from different sources (pi/K decay, charmed and unflavored hadron decay, and photon conversion into a muon pair). We pay special attention to the contribution from unflavored mesons (eta, eta', rho0, omega and phi). These mesons are abundant in air showers, their lifetimes are much shorter than those of charged pions or kaons, and they have decay branching ratios of order 10^-4 into final states containing a muon pair. We show that they may be the dominant source of muons at E_mu >10^3 TeV., Comment: Pdflatex, 28 pages, 6 figures

Charmed mesons may be produced when a primary cosmic ray or the leading hadron in an air shower collide with an atmospheric nucleon. At energies \ge 10^8 GeV their decay length becomes larger than 10 km, which implies that they tend to interact in the air instead of decaying. We study the collisions of long-lived charmed hadrons in the atmosphere. We show that (\Lambda_c,D)-proton diffractive processes and partonic collisions of any q^2 where the charm quark is an spectator have lower inelasticity than (p,\pi)-proton collisions. In particular, we find that a D meson deposits in each interaction just around 55% of the energy deposited by a pion. On the other hand, collisions involving the valence c quark (its annihilation with a sea cbar quark in the target or c-quark exchange in the t channel) may deposit most of D meson energy, but their frequency is low (below 0.1% of inelastic interactions). As a consequence, very energetic charmed hadrons may keep a significant fraction of their initial energy after several hadronic interactions, reaching much deeper in the atmosphere than pions or protons of similar energy., Comment: 13 pages, version to appear in PRD

Little Higgs models provide a natural explanation of the little hierarchy between the electroweak scale and a few TeV scale, where new physics is expected. Under the same inspiring naturalness arguments, this work completes a previous study on lepton flavor-changing processes in the Littlest Higgs model with T-parity exploring the channel that will eventually turn out to be the most sensitive, \mu-e conversion in nuclei. All one-loop contributions are carefully taken into account, results for the most relevant nuclei are provided and a discussion of the influence of the quark mixing is included. The results for the Ti nucleus are in good agreement with earlier work by Blanke et al., where a degenerate mirror quark sector was assumed. The conclusion is that, although this particular model reduces the tension with electroweak precision tests, if the restrictions on the parameter space derived from lepton flavor violation are taken seriously, the degree of fine tuning necessary to meet these constraints also disfavors this model., Comment: 26 pages, 7 figures, 4 tables; discussion improved, results unchanged, one reference added, version to appear in JHEP

In order to estimate the possibility to observe exotic physics in a neutrino telescope, it is essential to first understand the flux of atmospheric neutrinos, muons and dimuons. We study the production of these leptons by high-energy cosmic rays. We identify three main sources of muons of energy E > 10^6 GeV: the weak decay of charm and bottom mesons and the electromagnetic decay of unflavored mesons. Contrary to the standard assumption, we find that eta mesons, not the prompt decay of charm hadrons, are the dominant source of atmospheric muons at these energies. We show that, as a consequence, the ratio between the neutrino and muon fluxes is significantly reduced. For dimuons, which may be a background for long-lived staus produced near a neutrino telescope, we find that pairs of E ~ 10^7 GeV forming an angle above 10^-6 rad are produced through D (80%) or B (10%) meson decay and through Drell-Yan proceses (10%). The frequency of all these processes has been evaluated using the jet code PYTHIA., Comment: 10 pages, 4 figures; published version

We recalculate the leading one-loop contributions to mu > e gamma and mu -> eee in the Littlest Higgs model with T-parity, recovering previous results for the former. When all the Goldstone interactions are taken into account, the latter is also ultraviolet finite. The present experimental limits on these processes require a somewhat heavy effective scale ~2.5 TeV, or the flavour alignment of the Yukawa couplings of light and heavy leptons at the ~10% level, or the splitting of heavy lepton masses to a similar precision. Present limits on tau decays set no bounds on the corresponding parameters involving the tau lepton, Comment: 41 pages, 11 figures; v3: matches published version in JHEP

Ultrahigh energy cosmic rays provide a unique ground for probing new physics. In this talk we review the possibility of testing TeV gravity in interactions of cosmogenic neutrinos and the potential to discover long-lived exotic particles in nucleon-produced air showers, such as gluinos of split-SUSY models or staus of supersymmetric models with a gravitino LSP., Comment: Presented at the XXXI International Conference of Theoretical Physics "Matter To The Deepest: Recent Developments In Physics of Fundamental Interactions", Ustron, 5-11 September 2007, Poland; 7 pages

We present a new tool for editing Feynman diagrams as well as several extensions in version 5.3 of the package FormCalc for the calculation of Feynman diagrams., Comment: 8 pages, contribution to the proceedings of the ACAT workshop, Amsterdam, April 23-27, 2007

Models with extra dimensions and the fundamental scale at the TeV could imply sign als in large neutrino telescopes due to gravitational scattering of cosmogenic neu trinos in the detection volume. Apart from the production of microscopic black hol es, extensively studied in the literature, we present gravity-mediated interactions at larger distances, that can be calculated in the e ikonal approximation. In these elastic processes the neutrino loses a small fracti on of energy to a hadronic shower and keeps going. The event rate of these events is higher than that of black hole formation and the signal is distinct: no charged leptons and possibly multiple-bang events., Comment: 5 pages; to appear in the proceedings of the Workshop on Exotic Physics with Neutrino Telesocpes, Uppsala 20-22 September 2006

Cosmic rays from outer space enter the atmosphere with energies of up to 10^{11} GeV. The initial particle or a secondary hadron inside the shower may then interact with an air nucleon to produce nonstandard particles. In this article we study the production of new physics by high energy cosmic rays, focusing on the long-lived gluino of split-SUSY models and a WIMP working as dark matter. We first deduce the total flux of hadron events at any depth in the atmosphere, showing that secondary hadrons can not be neglected. Then we use these results to find the flux of gluinos and WIMPs that reach the ground after being produced inside air showers. We also evaluate the probability of producing these exotic particles in a single proton shower of ultrahigh energy. Finally we discuss the possible signal in current and projected experiments. While the tiny flux of WIMPs does not seem to have any phenomenological consequences, we show that the gluinos could modify substantially the profile of a small fraction of extensive air showers. In particular, they could produce a distinct signal observable at AUGER in showers of large zenith angle., Comment: 9 pages, version to appear in PRD

Programming techniques which extend the capabilities of FeynArts and FormCalc are introduced and explained using examples from real applications., Comment: 5 pages, proceedings contribution to Loops and Legs 2006, Eisenach, Germany

We investigate the constraints on flavour-changing neutral heavy Higgs-boson decays H-> b \bar s from b -> s gamma bounds on the flavour-mixing parameters of the MSSM with non-minimal flavour violation (NMFV). In our analysis we include the contributions from the SM and new physics due to general flavour mixing in the squark mass matrices. We study the case of one and two non-zero flavour-mixing parameters and find that in the latter case the interference can raise the Higgs flavour-changing branching ratios by one or two orders of magnitude with respect to previous predictions based on a single non-zero parameter and in agreement with present constraints from $B$ physics. In the course of our work we developed a new "FeynArts" model file for the NMFV MSSM and added the necessary code for the evaluation to "FormCalc". Both extensions are publicly available., Comment: LaTeX2e, 15 pages, 4 figures. Computation improved and figures replaced accordingly. Some references added. Main conclusions remain untouched

Cosmogenic neutrinos reach the Earth with energies around 10^9 GeV, and their interactions with matter will be measured in upcoming experiments (Auger, IceCube). Models with extra dimensions and the fundamental scale at the TeV could imply signals in these experiments. In particular, the production of microscopic black holes by cosmogenic neutrinos has been extensively studied in the literature. Here we make a complete analysis of gravity-mediated interactions at larger distances, where they can be calculated in the eikonal approximation. In these processes a neutrino of energy E_\nu interacts elastically with a parton inside a nucleon, loses a small fraction y of its energy, and starts a hadronic shower of energy y E_\nu << E_\nu. We analyze the ultraviolet dependence and the relevance of graviton emission in these processes, and show that they are negligible. We also study the energy distribution of cosmogenic events in AMANDA and IceCube and the possibility of multiple-bang events. For any neutrino flux, the observation of an enhanced rate of neutral current events above 100 TeV in neutrino telescopes could be explained by TeV-gravity interactions. The values of the fundamental scale of gravity that IceCube could reach are comparable to those to be explored at the LHC., Comment: 10 pages, 7 figures; new section on air showers added, version to be published

Lepton flavor and CP violation in supersymmetric models are briefly reviewed. After a short motivation and an introduction to the phenomenology, model independent constraints on mass insertions, predictions of SUSY GUT models and rates for several LFV and CPV processes are presented., Comment: 4 pages; Contribution to the Proceedings of "SUSY 2004", June 17-23, 2004, Tsukuba, Japan

The existence of extra dimensions allows the possibility that the fundamental scale of gravity is at the TeV. If that is the case, gravity could dominate the interactions of ultra-high energy cosmic rays. In particular, the production of microscopic black holes by cosmogenic neutrinos has been estimated in a number of papers. We consider here gravity-mediated interactions at larger distances, where they can be calculated in the eikonal approximation. We show that for the expected flux of cosmogenic neutrinos these elastic processes give a stronger signal than black hole production in neutrino telescopes. Taking the bounds on the higher dimensional Planck mass M_D (D=4+n) from current air shower experiments, for n=2 (6) elastic collisions could produce up to 118 (34) events per year at IceCube. On the other hand, the absence of any signal would imply a bound of M_D>~5 TeV., Comment: 10 pages, 1 figure; version to appear in Phys. Rev. Lett

In supersymmetric (SUSY) models the misalignment between fermion and sfermion families introduces unsuppressed flavor-changing processes. Even if the mass parameters are chosen to give no flavor violation, family dependent radiative corrections make this adjustment not stable. In particular, due to the observed large neutrino mixings and potentially large neutrino Yukawa couplings, sizable lepton flavor violation (LFV) is expected. After introducing the basic concepts, the framework and the main assumptions, we report on a recent study of rare leptonic decays in a class of SUSY-GUT models with three quasi-degenerate neutrinos. We show that LFV effects are likely visible in forthcoming experiments., Comment: 10 pages, 3 figures. Contribution to the XXVII International Conference of Theoretical Physics, Ustron, Poland, September 15-21, 2003

In supersymmetric (SUSY) models the misalignment between fermion and sfermion families introduces unsuppressed flavor-changing processes. Even if the mass parameters are chosen to give no flavor violation, family dependent radiative corrections make this adjustment not stable. We analyze the rate of l --> l' gamma in SUSY-GUT models with three quasi-degenerate neutrinos and universal scalar masses at the Planck scale. We pay special attention to a recently proposed scenario where the low-energy neutrino mixings are generated from identical quark and lepton mixings at large scales. We show that: (i) To take universal slepton masses at the GUT scale is a very poor approximation, even in no-scale models. (ii) For large neutrino Yukawa couplings the decay mu --> e gamma would be observed in the planned experiment at PSI. (iii) For large values of tanbeta the tau coupling gives important corrections, pushing mu --> e gamma and tau --> mu gamma to accessible rates. In particular, the non-observation of these processes in the near future would exclude the scenario with unification of quark and lepton mixing angles. (iv) The absence of lepton flavor violating decays in upcoming experiments would imply a low value of tanbeta, small neutrino couplings, and large (>~ 250$ GeV) SUSY-breaking masses., Comment: 13 pages, 4 figures. v3: introduction and discussion improved and references added; version to appear in EPJC

The observation of charged lepton flavor non-conservation would be a clear signature of physics beyond the Standard Model. In particular, supersymmetric (SUSY) models introduce mixings in the sneutrino and the charged slepton sectors which could imply flavor-changing processes at rates accessible to upcoming experiments. In this paper we analyze the possibility to observe Z --> lep_I lep_J in the GigaZ option of TESLA at DESY. We show that although models with SUSY masses above the current limits could predict a branching ratio BR(Z --> mu e) accessible to the experiment, they would imply an unobserved rate of mu --> e gamma and thus are excluded. In models with a small mixing angle between the first and the third (or the second and the third) slepton families GigaZ could observe Z --> tau mu (or Z --> tau e) consistently with present bounds on lep_J --> lep_I gamma. In contrast, if the mixing angles between the three slepton families are large the bounds from mu --> e gamma push these processes below the reach of GigaZ. We show that in this case the masses of the three slepton families must be strongly degenerated (with mass differences of order 10^{-3}). We update the limits on the slepton mass insertions delta_{LL,RR,LR} and discuss the correlation between flavor changing and g_mu-2 in SUSY models., Comment: 23 pages, 6 figures. Version to appear in Phys. Rev. D

The TESLA Technical Design Report Part III: Physics at an e+e- Linear Collider, Comment: 192 pages, 131 figures. Some figures have reduced quality. Full quality figures can be obtained from http://tesla.desy.de/tdr. Editors - R.-D. Heuer, D.J. Miller, F. Richard, P.M. Zerwas

In scenarios with the fundamental unification scale at the TeV one expects string excitations of the standard model fields at accessible energies. We study the neutrino-nucleon cross section in these models. We show that duality of the scattering amplitude forces the existence of a tower of massive leptoquarks that mediate the process in the s-channel. Using the narrow-width approximation we find a sum rule for the production rate of resonances with different spin at each mass level. We show that these contributions can increase substantially the standard model neutrino-nucleon cross section, although seem insufficient in order to explain the cosmic ray events above the GZK cutoff energy., Comment: 10 pages, 1 figure, version to appear in PRL

Present evidences for neutrino masses and lepton flavour mixings allow to predict, in the Standard Model with light neutrinos, branching rates for the decays Z --> e mu, mu tau, e tau of less than 10^{-54}, while present experimental exclusion limits from LEP 1 are of order 10^{-5}. The GigaZ option of the TESLA Linear Collider project will extend the sensitivity down to about 10^{-8}. We study in a systematic way some minimal extensions of the Standard Model and show that GigaZ might well be sensitive to the rates predicted from these scenarios., Comment: 24 pages, 4 figures, LaTeX, uses axodraw.sty

We review the features of top-quark decays and loop-induced effects in the production cross section and CP-violating observables of e+e- -> t t-bar which are specific to the R-parity conserving Minimal Supersymmetric Standard Model (MSSM)., Comment: LaTeX, 28 pages, 10 figures included, uses cite.sty. Contribution to the proceedings of the 2nd Joint ECFA/DESY Workshop on Physics and Detectors for a Linear Electron-Positron Collider. References added

We discuss predictions for the lepton-flavour changing decays Z --> e mu, mu tau, e tau which may be searched for at the Giga-Z option of the Tesla Linear Collider project with Z resonance production rates as high as 10^9. We try to be as model-independent as possible and consider both the Dirac and Majorana mass cases. The Standard Model, if being minimally extended by the inclusion of light neutrino masses with some mixings as observed in neutrino oscillation search experiments, predicts completely negligible rates. With a more general neutrino content quite interesting expectations may be derived., Comment: 35 pages, 3 figures; contribution to Proc. of 2nd joint ECFA/DESY Workshop on Physics Studies for a Future Linear Collider. Figure 3b replaced. Conclusions unchanged

The one-loop Minimal Supersymmetric Standard Model (MSSM) contributions to the weak and electromagnetic dipole form factors of the top quark are presented. Far from the Z peak, they are not sufficient to account for all the new physics effects. In the context of the calculation of the process e^+e^- -> t tbar to one loop in the MSSM, we compare the impact on the phenomenology of the CP-violating dipole form factors of the top quark with the contribution from CP-violating box graphs. Some exemplificative observables are analyzed and the relevance of both the contributions is pointed out. The one-loop expressions for the electromagnetic and weak dipole form factors in a general renormalizable theory and the SM and MSSM couplings and conventions are also given., Comment: 43 pages LaTeX. PS figures included with epsf.sty. Labels `N' and `T' in Tables 2,3 exchanged

The one-loop Minimal Supersymmetric Standard Model (MSSM) contributions to the weak and electromagnetic dipole form factors of heavy fermions are reviewed. For the $Z$ boson on shell, the weak-magnetic and weak-electric dipole moments of the $\tau$ lepton and the $b$ quark can be defined and directly connected to observables. But far from the $Z$ peak, the weak and electromagnetic dipole form factors are not enough to account for all the new physics effects. In the context of the calculation of the process $e^+e^-\to t\bar{t}$ to one loop in the MSSM, we compare the impact on the phenomenology of the CP-violating dipole form factors of the top quark with the contribution from CP-violating box graphs. Some exemplificative observables are analyzed and the relevance of both the contributions is pointed out. The set of tensor integrals employed, the one-loop expressions for the electromagnetic and weak dipole form factors in a general renormalizable theory and the SM and MSSM couplings and conventions are also given., Comment: 68 pages, 17 figures. LaTeX using epsf.sty. Eqs. (61,66,67) corrected. Labels `N' and `T' exchanged in Tables 5,6. Tables 6,7 and Figure 15 revised

The one-loop MSSM contributions to the weak dipole moments of the \tau lepton and the b quark (at the Z peak) as well as the electromagnetic and weak dipole form factors of the t quark (at arbitrary s>4m^2_t) are reviewed. Emphasis is given to the relevance of the t-quark CP-violating weak and electric dipole form factors as a part of the full one-loop correction to the process e^+e^- --> t \bar{t} in the MSSM., Comment: 8 pages, 2 figures. LaTeX using appb.sty (included) and epsf.sty. Contribution to the Zeuthen Workshop on Elementary Particle Physics "Loops and Legs in Gauge Theories", Rheinsberg, April 19-24, 1998. Typo in Eq. (5b) corrected. The complete ps-file is also available via WWW at http://www-itp.physik.uni-karlsruhe.de/prep/prep.html

A minimal supersymmetric version of the Standard Model with complex parameters allows contributions to the weak-electric dipole moments of fermions at the one-loop level. Assuming generation-diagonal trilinear soft-susy-breaking terms and the usual GUT constraint, a set of CP-violating physical phases can be introduced. In this paper the general expressions for the one-loop contribution to the WEDM in a generic renormalizable theory are given and the size of the WEDM of the tau lepton and the b quark in such a supersymmetric model is discussed., Comment: 12 pages, 1 ps + 4 eps figures, LaTeX using epsf.sty. Some comments and references added. Accepted in Phys. Lett. B. The complete ps-file is also available via WWW at http://www-itp.physik.uni-karlsruhe.de/prep/prep.html

The MSSM predictions at the one-loop level for the weak dipole moments of the \tau lepton and the b quark are presented. The imaginary part of the AWMDM is of the order of the SM contribution whereas the real part may be a factor 5 (20) larger for the \tau (b) in the high \tan\beta scenario, still a factor five below the QCD contribution in the b case. More interestingly, a contribution up to twelve orders of magnitude larger than in the SM may be obtained, already at the one-loop level, for the WEDM in a MSSM with complex parameters., Comment: 5 pages, 1 ps figure, LaTeX using appb.sty (included) and epsf.sty. Contribution to the XXI School of Theoretical Physics ``Recent Progress in theory and phenomenology of fundamental interactions", Ustron, Poland, September 1997. The complete ps-file is also available via WWW at http://www-itp.physik.uni-karlsruhe.de/prep/prep.html

The MSSM predictions at the one-loop level for the weak-magnetic dipole moments of the $\tau$ lepton and the $b$ quark are analysed. The entire supersymmetric parameter space is scannedwith the usual GUT constraint and common squark and slepton mass parameters. The real part of $a^W_\tau$ is dominated by the chargino contribution, being the same order as the SM one or even larger in the high $\tan\beta$ region whereas the imaginary part, due to Higgs boson diagrams, is negligible comparedto the SM value. The real part of$a^W_b$ is controlled mainly by charginos andalso by gluinos, when the mixing in the bottom squark sector is large, to yield, for high $\tan\beta$, a contribution one order of magnitude largerthan the pure electroweak SM value but a factor five smaller than the standard QCD contribution. The imaginary part of $a^W_b$ is the same order as in the SM., Comment: 14 pages, Latex, 4 eps and 1 ps figure, needs epsfig.sty. Minor changes, new references added. To be published in Phys. Lett. B

We analyze the contribution of the SUSY particles to the coupling of the lightest Higgs boson to two photons in supersymmetric theories. We discuss to what extent these contributions can be large enough to allow for a discrimination between the lightest SUSY and the standard Higgs particles in the decoupling limit where all other Higgs bosons are very heavy and no supersymmetric particle has been discovered at future colliders. We find that only chargino and top squark loops can generate a sizeable difference between the standard and the SUSY Higgs-photon couplings. For masses above 250 GeV, the effect of chargino loops on the two-photon width is however smaller than $\sim 10%$ in the entire SUSY parameter space. Top squarks heavier than 250 GeV can induce deviations larger than 10% only if their couplings to the Higgs boson are large. Since top squark contributions can be sizeable, we derive the two-loop QCD correction to squark loops and show that they are well under control., Comment: 30 pages, LaTeX, 8 figures, the complete *.ps file can be found at http://itpaxp1.physik.uni-karlsruhe.de/prep/prep.html

The possibility of testing trilinear neutral gauge boson couplings in radiative neutral current scattering at HERA is analyzed using a Monte Carlo program that includes the Standard Model at tree level and the anomalous vertices. Acceptance and isolation cuts are applied as well as optimized cuts to enhance the signal from new physics. The bounds on Z\gamma\gamma couplings that can be achieved are not so stringent as present bounds, even for high luminosities, but probe a different kinematical region almost unsensitive to form factors., Comment: LaTeX, 11 pages, 4 figures, uses feynman.tex and epsf.sty. Contribution to the proc. of the Workshop `Future Physics at HERA', DESY,Hamgurg, 1995-96

We study the sensitivity of LEP II and NLC, via two photon collisions, to the effects of anomalous $\tau \overline{\tau} \gamma$ couplings. We also discuss some CP-odd observables that can be useful to disentangle the contributions from the anomalous couplings. (5 figures included via epsf appended at the end as uuencoded compressed tar postscript file)., Comment: 11 pages, UG-FT-37/94 (names of the figures in the TeX file changed to match the ones in the uuencoded postscript file)