17177636
Quantum Gravity and Astrophysics: The Microwave Background and Other Thermal Sources
The problem of formulating a fully consistent quantum gravity theory (QGT) has not yet been solved. Even before we are able to work out the details of a complete theory, however, we do know some important qualitative features to be expected in any quantum theory. Fluctuations of the metric, for example, are expected and are associated with fluctuations of the lightcone. Lightcone fluctuations affect the arrival time of signals from distant sources in potentially measurable ways, broadening the spectra. In this paper, we start with a thermal spectrum and derive the form of spectral changes expected in a wide class of QGTs. We apply these results, valid for any thermal spectrum, to the cosmic microwave background (CMB). The CMB offers two advantages: (1) deviations from a thermal spectrum are well constrained, and (2) the radiation emanates from the most distant source of light, the surface of last scattering. We use existing CMB data to derive an upper bound on the value of $\Delta t,$ the mean spread in arrival times due to metric fluctuations: ${\Delta t} < 2.1 \times 10^{-14}$ s at the 95% confidence limit. This limit applies to a wide range of QGTs, and falsifies those predicting a larger spread in arrival times. We find this limit rules out at least one QGT, the 5-dimensional theory in which the "extra" dimension is flat. Tests of other models may also be possible, depending on the results of calculations to predict values of \Delta t,$ and also a second time scale, $\tau_c,$ the correlation time, which is the characteristic time scale of the metric fluctuations. We show that stronger limits on the value of $\Delta t,$ hence on lightcone fluctuations, can likely be derived through observations of of higher-T sources, e.g., in the X-ray and gamma-ray regimes.
120986058
Quantum thermal aspects of uniformly accelerating charged black holes
119090796
Fulling–Davies–Unruh effect and spontaneous excitation of an accelerated atom interacting with a quantum scalar field
Abstract We investigate, from the point of view of a coaccelerated frame, the spontaneous excitation of a uniformly accelerated two-level atom interacting with a scalar field in a thermal state at a finite temperature T and show that the same spontaneous excitation rate for the uniformly accelerated atom in the Minkowski vacuum obtained in the inertial frame can only be recovered in the coaccelerated frame assuming a thermal bath at the Fulling–Davies–Unruh temperature T FDU = a / 2 π for what appears to be the Minkowski vacuum to the inertial observer. Our discussion provides another example of a physical process different from those examined before in the literature to better understand the Fulling–Davies–Unruh effect.
118525095
Lamb shift for static atoms outside a Schwarzschild black hole
We study, by separately calculating the contributions of vacuum fluctuations and radiation reaction to the atomic energy level shift, the Lamb shift of a static two-level atom interacting with real massless scalar fields in the Boulware, Unruh, and Hartle-Hawking vacuums outside a Schwarzschild black hole. We find that in the Boulware vacuum, the Lamb shift gets a correction arising as a result of the backscattering of vacuum field modes off the space-time curvature, which is reminiscent of the correction to the Lamb shift induced by the presence of cavities. However, when the Unruh and Hartle-Hawking vacua are concerned, our results show that the Lamb shift behaves as if the atom were irradiated by a thermal radiation or immersed in a thermal bath at the Hawking temperature, depending on whether the scalar field is in the Unruh or the Hartle-Hawking vacuum. Remarkably, the thermal radiation is always backscattered by the space-time geometry.
119124346
Unruh effect and entanglement generation for accelerated atoms near a reflecting boundary
We study, in the framework of open systems, the entanglement generation of two independent uniformly accelerated atoms in interaction with the vacuum fluctuations of massless scalar fields subjected to a reflecting plane boundary. We demonstrate that, with the presence of the boundary, the accelerated atoms exhibit distinct features from static ones in a thermal bath at the corresponding Unruh temperature in terms of the entanglement creation at the neighborhood of the initial time. In this sense, accelerated atoms in vacuum do not necessarily have to behave as if they were static in a thermal bath at the Unruh temperature.
115459673
LIGHTCONE FLUCTUATIONS AND EXTRA DIMENSIONS
10829609
Halo-shape and relic-density exclusions of Sommerfeld-enhanced dark matter explanations of cosmic ray excesses.
Dark matter with Sommerfeld-enhanced annihilation has been proposed to explain observed cosmic ray positron excesses in the 10 GeV to TeV energy range. We show that the required enhancement implies thermal relic densities that are too small to be all of dark matter. We also show that the dark matter is sufficiently self-interacting that observations of elliptical galactic dark matter halos exclude large Sommerfeld enhancement for light force carriers. Resonant Sommerfeld enhancement does not modify these conclusions, and the astrophysical boosts required to resolve these discrepancies are disfavored, especially when significant self-interactions suppress halo substructure.
119123919
Fermion Mass Hierarchy and Proton Stability from Non-anomalous U(1)(F) in SUSY SU(5)
We present a realistic supersymmetric SU(5) model combined with a nonanomalous U(1){sub F} symmetry. We find a set of U(1){sub F} charges which automatically lead to the realistic mass hierarchy and mixing patterns for quarks, leptons, and neutrinos. All gauge anomalies, including the [U(1){sub F}]{sup 3} anomaly, are canceled in our model without invoking the Green-Schwarz mechanism or having exotic fields. Proton decay mediated by dimension-5 operators is automatically suppressed in our model, because the scale set by the largest right-handed neutrino mass is much less than the GUT scale.
105120712
Study of the polarization structure of J / psi ---> omega f2 (1270) decay process
118458603
Thermal relics in hidden sectors
Dark matter may be hidden, with no standard model gauge interactions. At the same time, in WIMPless models (WIMP: weakly interacting massive particles) with hidden matter masses proportional to hidden gauge couplings squared, the hidden dark matter's thermal relic density may naturally be in the right range, preserving the key quantitative virtue of WIMPs. We consider this possibility in detail. We first determine model-independent constraints on hidden sectors from big bang nucleosynthesis and the cosmic microwave background. Contrary to conventional wisdom, large hidden sectors are easily accommodated. A flavour-free version of the standard model is allowed if the hidden sector is just 30% colder than the observable sector after reheating. Alternatively, if the hidden sector contains a one-generation version of the standard model with characteristic mass scale below 1 MeV, even identical reheating temperatures are allowed. We then analyse hidden sector freeze-out in detail for a concrete model, solving the Boltzmann equation numerically and explaining the results from both observable and hidden sector points of view. We find that WIMPless dark matter does indeed obtain the correct relic density for masses in the range . The upper bound results from the requirement of perturbativity, and the lower bound assumes that the observable and hidden sectors reheat to the same temperature, and is raised to the MeV scale if the hidden sector is ten times colder. WIMPless dark matter therefore generalizes the WIMP paradigm to the largest mass range possible for viable thermal relics and provides a unified framework for exploring dark matter signals across nine orders of magnitude in dark matter mass.
67849491
Constraints on Dark Matter from Colliders
We show that colliders can impose strong constraints on models of dark matter, in particular, when the dark matter is light. We analyze models where the dark matter is a fermion or scalar interacting with quarks and/or gluons through an effective theory containing higher dimensional operators which represent heavier states that have been integrated out of the effective field theory. We determine bounds from existing Tevatron searches for monojets as well as expected LHC reaches for a discovery. We find that colliders can provide information which is complementary or in some cases even superior to experiments searching for direct detection of dark matter through its scattering with nuclei. In particular, both the Tevatron and the LHC can outperform spin-dependent searches by an order of magnitude or better over much of the parameter space, and if the dark matter couples mainly to gluons, the LHC can place bounds superior to any spin-independent search.