120798087
Dark matter search with the DAMA experiments
DAMA experiments are running deep underground in the Gran Sasso National Laboratory of I.N.F.N. Results on various rare event searches and, in particular, on WIMP annual modulation signature have been achieved.
118311956
DAMA investigations on Dark Matter at Gran Sasso: results and perspectives
The DAMA/NaI experiment (≃ 100 kg highly radiopure NaI(Tl)) at the Gran Sasso National Laboratory of the I.N.F.N. had the unique feature to effectively investigate the presence of Dark Matter particles in the galactic halo by exploiting the model independent annual modulation signature. A total exposure of more than 105 kg × day, collected over seven annual cycles, has pointed out at 6.3 σ C.L. an effect which satisfies all the many peculiarities of the signature. Neither systematics nor side reactions able to account for the observed effect were found. No experiment whose result can be directly compared in a model independent way with the experimental one of DAMA/NaI is available so far. Searches in space experiments are not in contradiction with DAMA/NaI. Several (but still few with respect to the possibilities) corollary model dependent quests for the candidate particle have also been carried out; others are in progress. At present the second generation DAMA/LIBRA set‐up (≃ 250 kg highly radiopure NaI(...
17766827
Investigating electron interacting dark matter
Some extensions of the standard model provide dark matter candidate particles which can have a dominant coupling with the lepton sector of the ordinary matter. Thus, such dark matter candidate particles (chi(0)) can be directly detected only through their interaction with electrons in the detectors of a suitable experiment, while they are lost by experiments based on the rejection of the electromagnetic component of the experimental counting rate. These candidates can also offer a possible source of the 511 keV photons observed from the galactic bulge. In this paper this scenario is investigated. Some theoretical arguments are developed and related phenomenological aspects are discussed. Allowed intervals and regions for the characteristic phenomenological parameters of the considered model and of the possible mediator of the interaction are also derived considering the DAMA/NaI data.
119701812
Signals from dark Universe: DAMA/LIBRA at LNGS
The DAMA/LIBRA set-up (about 250 kg highly radiopure NaI(Tl) sensitive mass) is running at the Gran Sasso National Laboratory of the INFN. The first DAMA/LIBRA results point out the presence of a dark matter particle component in the galactic halo, as well as the former DAMA/NaI set-up; cumulatively the data support such evidence at 8.2σ CL and satisfy all the peculiarities of the dark matter annual modulation signature.
124862840
DIRECT DETECTION OF DARK MATTER PARTICLES
117048271
First DAMA/LIBRA Results and Beyond
The DAMA project is an observatory for rare processes and it is operative deep underground at the Gran Sasso National Laboratory of the I.N.F.N. Its main apparatus is the DAMA/LIBRA set-up, consisting of ≃250 kg highly radiopure NaI(Tl) detectors. Its first results — obtained by exploiting over four annual cycles the model independent annual modulation signature for Dark Matter (DM) particles — confirm by those of the former DAMA/NaI, supporting the evidence for Dark Matter presence in the galactic halo at 8.2 σ C.L.. The DAMA/NaI and DAMA/LIBRA data, in fact, satisfy all the many peculiarities of the DM annual modulation signature. Neither systematic effects nor side reactions able to account for the observed modulation amplitude and to contemporaneously satisfy all the several requirements of the DM signature are available. Future perspectives are also addressed.
102507809
Natural electroweak symmetry breaking from scale invariant Higgs mechanism
We construct a minimal viable extension of the standard model (SM) with classical scale symmetry. Its scalar sector contains a complex singlet in addition to the SM Higgs doublet. The scale-invariant and CP-symmetric Higgs potential generates radiative electroweak symmetry breaking ` a la Coleman-Weinberg, and gives a natural solution to the hierarchy problem, free from fine-tuning. Besides the 125 GeV SM-like Higgs particle, it predicts a new CP-even Higgs (serving as the pseudo-Nambu-Goldstone boson of scale symmetry breaking) and a CP-odd scalar singlet (providing the dark matter candidate) at weak scale. We systematically analyze experimental constraints from direct LHC Higgs searches and electroweak precision tests, as well as theoretical bounds from unitarity, triviality and vacuum stability. We demonstrate the viable parameter space, and discuss implications for new Higgs and dark matter (DM) searches at the upcoming LHC runs and for the on-going direct detections of DM.
5881766
Scale of mass generation for Majorana neutrinos
Scales of mass generation for Majorana neutrinos (as well as quarks and leptons) can be probed from high energy 2 → n inelastic scattering involving a multiple longitudinal gauge boson final state. We demonstrate that the unitarity of 2 → n scattering puts the strongest new upper limit on the scale of fermion mass generation, independent of the electroweak symmetry breaking scale v = ( √ 2GF) 1 2 . Strikingly, for Majorana neutrinos (quarks and leptons), we find that the strongest 2 → n limits fall in a narrow range, 136 − 170 TeV (3 − 107 TeV) with n = 20 − 24 (n = 2 − 12), depending on the observed fermion masses. Physical implications are discussed.
119290289
Spontaneous mirror parity violation, common origin of matter and dark matter, and the LHC signatures
Existence of a mirror world in the Universe is a fundamental way to restore the observed parity violation in weak interactions and provides the lightest mirror nucleon as a unique GeV-scale dark matter particle candidate. The visible and mirror worlds share the same spacetime of the Universe and are connected by a unique space-inversion symmetry-the mirror parity (P). We conjecture that the mirror parity is respected by the fundamental interaction Lagrangian, and study its spontaneous breaking from minimizing the Higgs vacuum potential. The domain-wall problem is resolved by a unique soft-breaking linear term from the P-odd weak-singlet Higgs field. We also derive a constraint from big-bang nucleosynthesis. We then analyze the neutrino seesaw for both visible and mirror worlds, and demonstrate that the desired amounts of visible matter and mirror dark matter in the Universe arise from a common origin of CP violation in the neutrino sector via leptogenesis. We derive the Higgs mass spectrum and Higgs couplings with gauge bosons and fermions. We show their consistency with the direct Higgs searches and the indirect precision constraints. We further study the distinctive signatures of the predicted nonstandard Higgs bosons at the LHC. Finally, we analyze the direct detections of GeV-scale mirror dark matter by the TEXONO and CDEX experiments.
7672098
Unitarity in Higher Dimensions and Gauge Unification
Unitarity of the 4d standard model is ensured by the conventional Higgs mechanism with a fundamental spin-0 Higgs boson, responsible for gauge boson mass-generations. On the contrary Kaluza-Klein (KK) compactification of extra spatial dimensions can geometrically realize the gauge boson mass generation without invoking a fundamental Higgs scalar. We reveal that massive gauge boson scattering in the compactified theories is unitary at low energies, and the unitarity violation is {\it delayed} to the intrinsic ultraviolet (UV) scale of the higher dimensional gauge theory. We demonstrate that this is a generic consequence of the ``geometric Higgs mechanism'' (GHM), manifested via Kaluza-Klein equivalence theorem (KK-ET). We further show that the presence of many gauge KK states below the UV cutoff scale imposes strong bounds on the highest KK level (N_KK). Applying these bounds to higher-dimensional SUSY GUTs implies that only a small number of KK states can be used to accelerate gauge coupling unification, and suggests that the GUT scale in the 5d minimal SUSY SU(5) is above 10^{14} GeV.
73581246
Unitarity of deconstructed five-dimensional Yang–Mills theory
Abstract The low-energy properties of a compactified five-dimensional gauge theory can be reproduced in a four-dimensional theory with a replicated gauge group and an appropriate gauge symmetry breaking pattern. The lightest vector bosons in these “deconstructed” or “remodeled” theories have masses and couplings approximately equal to those of the Kaluza–Klein tower of massive vector states present in a compactified higher-dimensional gauge theory. We analyze the unitarity of low-energy scattering of the massive vector bosons in a deconstructed theory, and examine the relationship between the scale of unitarity violation and the scale of the underlying chiral symmetry breaking dynamics which breaks the replicated gauge groups. As in the case of compactified five-dimensional gauge theories, low-energy unitarity is ensured through an interlacing cancellation among contributions from the tower of massive vector bosons. We show that the behavior of these scattering amplitudes is manifest without such intricate cancellations in the scattering of the would-be Goldstone bosons of the deconstructed theory. Unlike compactified five-dimensional gauge theories, the amplitude for longitudinal vector boson scattering in deconstructed theories does grow with energy, though this effect is suppressed by 1/( N +1), with N +1 being the number of replicated gauge groups.