Mon·Jul 15, 2024Monday·July 15, 2024

1. 01*

   NNLO+PS predictions for Higgs production through bottom-quark fusion

   Christian Biello🇩🇪 · Aparna Sankar🇩🇪 · Marius Wiesemann🇩🇪 · Giulia Zanderighi🇩🇪

   We present next-to-next-to-leading-order (NNLO) QCD corrections for Higgs production through bottom-quark annihilation (\bbH{}) matched to parton showers (NNLO+PS) using the \minnlo{} technique. The \minnlo{} method is adapted for the extra scale dependence due to the Yukawa coupling renormalized in the $\overline{\mathrm{MS}}$ scheme. The computation has been carried out in the five flavour scheme (5FS) neglecting the bottom mass. Results are compared against fixed-order predictions at NNLO and resummed predictions at next-to-next-to-leading-logarithmic (NNLL) accuracy. We also present preliminary results within the four-flavour scheme (4FS) setup, reaching a new level of precision in the massive scheme.

   hep-phPoS(2025)·1 citation
2. 02*

   Polarized Dipole Scattering Amplitudes meet the Valence Quark Model

   Adrian Dumitru🇺🇸 · Heikki Mäntysaari🇫🇮 · Yossathorn Tawabutr🇫🇮

   The recently revised small-$x$ helicity evolution, resumming the double-logarithmic factor, ${\alpha }_s{\ln }^2(1/x)$, allows for the study of helicity distributions of quarks and gluons at small Bjorken $x$, corresponding to high center-of-mass energy. In this work, we calculate the moderate-$x$ initial conditions in the regime, ${\alpha }_s{\ln }^2(1/x)\sim 1$, for the small-$x$ helicity evolution using a light-front valence quark model of the proton, which provides additional physical information about the target. The perturbative emission and absorption of a gluon by the valence quarks are also included. The results, given in Eqs. (35), provide a new set of initial conditions with a significantly reduced number of free parameters than conventional models. Consequently, the predictive power of small-$x$ helicity evolution is expected to improve once the initial conditions from this work are incorporated.

   hep-phnucl-thPRD(2024)·8 citations
3. 03*

   Observational bounds on a possible electron-to-proton mass ratio variation and constraints in the lepton-specific 2HDM

   R. G. Albuquerque🇧🇷 · R. F. L. Holanda🇧🇷 · I. E. T. R. Mendonça🇧🇷 · P. S. Rodrigues da Silva🇧🇷

   In this work, we test a possible redshift variation of the electron-to-proton mass ratio, $\mu =m_e/m_p$, directly from galaxy cluster gas mass fraction measurements and type Ia supernovae observations. Our result reveals no variation of $\mu$ within 1~$\sigma$. From the point of view of Particle Physics, we can use the precision on these results to constrain the parameter space of models beyond the Standard Model of electroweak interactions. We exemplify this by focusing on a specific Two-Higgs doublet model (2HDM), where the second scalar doublet couples exclusively to leptons. An important parameter in the model concerns the ratio between its vacuum expectation values, defined by $\tan \beta \equiv v_2/v_1$. In our approach, we can constrain the inverse parameter $(\cot \beta )$ to an optimal value, $(\cot \beta )=(2.003\pm 0.081)\cdot 10^{-3}$, with the highest vacuum expectation value for 2HDM, $v_2$, estimated at around $240.57\pm 2.93$~GeV. Also, by taking into account the discrepancy in the anomalous magnetic moment of the muon found between theory and experiment, we can reduce the validity region for this model and establish bounds on the scalar masses, in light of our findings from galaxy cluster data for $\mu$. This study contributes valuable insights to the understanding of the interface between Particle Physics and Astrophysics, establishing a new interrelationship between data on the large-scale structure of the Universe and subatomic Physics.

   hep-phastro-ph.COastro-ph.GAAstropart.Phys.(2025)·2 citations
4. 04*

   Solving recurrence relations for multiloop integrals in the limit of large values of the dimensional regularization parameter

   P. A. Baikov🇷🇺

   A method for calculating the $1/d$ expansion coefficients for solutions of integration by parts relations for Feynman integrals is presented. The idea is to use linear substitutions to transform these relations to an explicitly recursive form. A possible type of such substitutions is proposed for the case of vacuum integrals. Its applicability is shown for several families of massless (with one massive line) vacuum integrals up to the 7-loop level.

   hep-phJHEP(2024)·0 citations
5. 05*

   Disentangling SMEFT and UV contributions in $h\to Z\gamma$ and $h\to \gamma \gamma$ decays

   Kostas Mantzaropoulos🇬🇷

   LHC searches have revealed that the Higgs boson decay to a photon pair is nearly consistent with the Standard Model (SM), whereas recently, there is evidence for the decay of the Higgs boson to a $Z$-boson and a photon. These decays are governed by the same set of Wilson-coefficients at the tree level in Standard Model Effective Field Theory (SMEFT). In this study, we aim to explain this potential discrepancy between the decays $h\to \gamma \gamma$ and $h\to Z\gamma$. We conduct a model-independent analysis in SMEFT to determine the magnitude and features of the Wilson coefficients required to account for the observed distinction between the two signal strengths. Following this, we adopt a top-down approach, considering all single and two field extensions of the SM, including scalars and fermions, as candidates for new interactions. We perform the matching of these models to one loop using automated packages and compare the models' predictions regarding $h\to Z\gamma$.

   hep-phPRD(2024)·10 citations
6. 06*

   Quantification of the low-$p_{\mathrm{T}}$ pion excess in heavy-ion collisions at the LHC and top RHIC energy

   Pengzhong Lu🇩🇪 · Rafet Kavak🇩🇪 · Andrea Dubla🇩🇪 · Silvia Masciocchi🇩🇪 · Ilya Selyuzhenkov🇩🇪

   While the abundances of the final state hadrons in relativistic heavy-ion collisions are rather well described by the thermal particle production, the shape of the transverse momentum, $p_{\mathrm{T}}$, distribution below $p_{\mathrm{T}}\approx 500$ MeV$/c$, is still poorly understood. We propose a procedure to quantify the model-to-data differences using Bayesian inference techniques, which allows for consistent treatment of the experimental uncertainties and tests the completeness of the available hydrodynamic frameworks. Using relativistic fluid framework Fluid$u$M with PCE coupled to \trento initial state and FastReso decays, we analyse \pt distribution of identified charged hadrons measured in heavy-ion collisions at top RHIC and the LHC energies, and identify an excess of pions produced below $p_{\mathrm{T}}\approx 500$ MeV$/c$. Our results provide new input for the interpretation of the pion excess as either missing components in the thermal particle yield description or as an evidence for a different particle production mechanism.

   hep-phNucl.Sci.Tech.(2025)·13 citations
7. 07*

   SU(3) symmetry analysis in charmed baryon two body decays with penguin diagram contribution

   Zhi-Peng Xing🇨🇳 · Yu-Ji Shi🇨🇳 · Jin Sun🇰🇷 · Ye Xing🇨🇳

   An increasing number of experimental measurements from the BESIII, Belle, and Belle-II collaborations encourage investigations into charmed baryon two-body decay processes. By including contributions from the penguin diagrams that are ignored in previous studies, we perform a global analysis with SU(3) flavor symmetry. Assuming all form factors are real, we achieve a remarkable minimal ${\chi }^2/d.o.f=0.788$ and find that the contribution of the amplitude proportional to $V_{cb}^{\ast }{V}_{ub}$ is of the order $\sim 0.01$, comparable with the contribution of the tree-level diagram. Additionally, by using the KPW theorem to reduce the number of amplitudes from 13 to 7 in the leading contribution, it becomes possible to consider the complex form factor case for the leading IRA amplitude in the global analysis. However, the analysis of complex form factors significantly conflicts with the experimental data $Br({\Xi }_c^0\to {\Xi }^{-}{\pi }^{+})$, and by excluding this data, ${\chi }^2/d.o.f$ is reduced from 5.95 to 1.19. Although the analysis of complex form factors shows a significant central value of the penguin diagram contribution, the large errors from the corresponding form factors make it a challenge to precisely determine its true contribution. Consequently, the direct CP violation in decay processes is predicted to be approximately zero. With more data in future experiments, the penguin diagram contribution with the amplitude proportional to $V_{cb}^{\ast }{V}_{ub}$ will be precisely determined, allowing for a more accurate prediction of CP violation. Our analysis necessitates further theoretical investigations and experimental measurements in the future.

   hep-phEPJC(2024)·17 citations
8. 08*

   Theoretical advances in electroweak, Higgs, and top physics at the LHC

   Mathieu Pellen🇩🇪

   In these proceedings, I review recent precision calculations relevant for the LHC, all related to the electroweak, Higgs or top sector of the Standard Model. These applications range from triboson production to the production of a top-antitop pair in association with a W boson and to Higgs production in association with another Higgs boson, a top-antitop pair or a W boson. These proceedings reflect a presentation given at DIS2024 and provide a snapshot of the current frontier for theoretical predictions at the LHC.

   hep-phhep-exPoS(2025)·0 citations
9. 09*

   Finding flavons at colliders

   Gauhar Abbas🇮🇳 · Ashutosh Kumar Alok🇮🇳 · Neetu Raj Singh Chundawat🇮🇳 · Najimuddin Khan🇮🇳 · Neelam Singh🇮🇳

   We conduct a comprehensive investigation into the flavour phenomenology and collider signatures of flavon of ${\mathcal{Z}}_{\mathrm{N}}\times {\mathcal{Z}}_{\mathrm{M}}$ flavour symmetries for the soft symmetry-breaking scenario and a new symmetry-conserving mechanism at the high-luminosity LHC, high energy LHC, and a 100 TeV hadron collider. The flavour physics of quark and leptonic observables places different bounds on the parameter space of flavons of ${\mathcal{Z}}_{\mathrm{N}}\times {\mathcal{Z}}_{\mathrm{M}}$ flavour symmetries. On the collider side, the decay $t\to ca$ can be probed by the high-luminosity LHC, high energy LHC, and a 100 TeV hadron collider for the ${\mathcal{Z}}_8\times {\mathcal{Z}}_{22}$ flavour symmetry. The inclusive production signatures can be used to probe the flavon of all the ${\mathcal{Z}}_{\mathrm{N}}\times {\mathcal{Z}}_{\mathrm{M}}$ flavour symmetries for the soft symmetry-breaking scenario for a heavy flavon at a 100 TeV collider. Flavons of all the ${\mathcal{Z}}_{\mathrm{N}}\times {\mathcal{Z}}_{\mathrm{M}}$ flavour symmetries can be probed at high energy LHC and a 100 TeV collider for a low mass in the case of soft symmetry-breaking. The di-flavon production is within reach of the high-luminosity LHC, high energy LHC, and a 100 TeV collider only for a light flavon. The 14 TeV high-luminosity LHC can probe only the ${\mathcal{Z}}_2\times {\mathcal{Z}}_5$ and ${\mathcal{Z}}_8\times {\mathcal{Z}}_{22}$ flavour symmetries for a few specific inclusive signatures. The symmetry-conserving scenario remains beyond the detection capabilities of any collider.

   hep-phhep-exPRD(2024)·8 citations
10. 10*

    All order factorization for virtual Compton scattering at next-to-leading power

    Jakob Schoenleber🇺🇸 · Robert Szafron🇺🇸

    We discuss all-order factorization for the virtual Compton process at next-to-leading power (NLP) in the ${\Lambda }_{\mathrm{QCD}}/Q$ and $\sqrt{-t}/Q$ expansion (twist-3), both in the double-deeply-virtual case and the single-deeply-virtual case. We use the soft-collinear effective theory (SCET) as the main theoretical tool. We conclude that collinear factorization holds in the double-deeply virtual case, where both photons are far off-shell. The agreement is found with the known results for the hard matching coefficients at leading order ${\alpha }_s^0$, and we can therefore connect the traditional approach with SCET. In the single-deeply-virtual case, commonly called deeply virtual Compton scattering (DVCS), the contribution of non-target collinear regions complicates the factorization. These include momentum modes collinear to the real photon and (ultra)soft interactions between the photon-collinear and target-collinear modes. However, such contributions appear only for the transversely polarized virtual photon at the NLP accuracy and in fact it is the only NLP $\sim ({\Lambda }_{\mathrm{QCD}}/Q{)}^1\sim (\sqrt{-t}/Q{)}^1$ contribution in that case. We therefore conclude that the DVCS amplitude for a longitudinally polarized virtual photon, where the leading power $\sim ({\Lambda }_{\mathrm{QCD}}/Q{)}^0\sim (\sqrt{-t}/Q{)}^0$ contribution vanishes, is free of non-target collinear contributions and the collinear factorization in terms of twist-3 GPDs holds in that case as well.

    hep-phJHEP(2024)·9 citations
11. 11*

    Novel structures and collapse of solitons in nonminimally gravitating dark matter halos

    Jiajun Chen🇨🇳 · Hong-Yi Zhang🇨🇳

    Ultralight dark matter simulations predict condensates with short-range correlation, known as solitons or boson stars, at the centers of dark matter halos. This paper investigates the formation and collapse of dark matter solitons influenced by nonminimal gravitational effects, characterized by gradient-dependent self-interactions of dark matter and an additional source in Poisson's equation for gravity. Our simulations suggest that the initial evolution of dark matter resembles that without nonminimal gravitational effects. However, regions with negative potential curvature may develop, and solitons will collapse when their densities reach certain critical values for both positive and negative coupling constants. With strong nonminimal gravitational effects, we verify that linear density perturbations could grow on both large and small scales, potentially enhancing structure formation.

    hep-phJCAP(2024)·18 citations
12. 12*

    The ${\Lambda }_c\to \Lambda l^{+}{\nu }_{\ell }$ weak decay including new physics

    Fernando Alvarado🇪🇸 · Luis Alvarez-Ruso🇪🇸 · Eliecer Hernandez🇪🇸 · Juan Nieves🇪🇸 · Neus Penalva🇪🇸

    We investigate the ${\Lambda }_c\to \Lambda {\ell }^{+}{\nu }_{\ell }$ decay with a focus on potential new physics (NP) effects in the $\ell =\mu$ channel. We employ an effective Hamiltonian within the framework of the Standard Model Effective Field Theory (SMEFT) to consider generalized dimension-6 semileptonic $c\to s$ operators of scalar, pseudoscalar, vector, axial-vector and tensor types. We rely on Lattice QCD (LQCD) for the hadronic transition form factors, using heavy quark spin symmetry (HQSS) to determine those that have not yet been obtained on the lattice. Uncertainties due to the truncation of the NP Hamiltonian and different implementations of HQSS are taken into account. As a result, we unravel the NP discovery potential of the ${\Lambda }_c\to \Lambda$ semileptonic decay in different observables. Our findings indicate high sensitivity to NP in lepton flavour universality ratios, probing multi-TeV scales in some cases. On the theoretical side, we identify LQCD uncertainties in axial and vector form factors as critical for improving NP sensitivity, alongside better SMEFT uncertainty estimations.

    hep-phJHEP(2024)·4 citations
13. 13*

    QCD corrections to Higgs boson production and $H\to b\bar{b}$ decay in weak boson fusion

    Konstantin Asteriadis🇩🇪 · Arnd Behring🇨🇭 · Kirill Melnikov🇩🇪 · Ivan Novikov🇩🇪 · Raoul Röntsch🇮🇹

    We study QCD corrections to the process where a Higgs boson is produced in weak boson fusion and then decays into a pair of massive $b$ quarks. We find that typical experimental criteria used to identify $b$ jets in this process affect QCD corrections to the decay, making it necessary to account for them in the proper description of this process. Indeed, if corrections to the production and decay are combined, the fiducial cross section of the weak boson fusion process $pp\to H(\to b\bar{b})jj$ is reduced by about $40\%$ relative to leading-order predictions, compared to just about $8\%$ if only corrections to the production process are considered. We investigate the origin of these large corrections through next-to-next-to-leading-order and conclude that they appear because a number of independent moderately-large effects conspire to significantly reduce the fiducial cross section for this process.

    hep-phPRD(2024)·5 citations
14. 14*

    On-shell Renormalization with Vector-like Leptons, One-loop Muon-Higgs Coupling and Muon g-2

    Kilian Möhling🇩🇪 · Dominik Stöckinger🇩🇪 · Hyejung Stöckinger-Kim🇩🇪

    Models with vector-like leptons can strongly modify the lepton mass generation mechanism and lead to correlated effects in lepton-Higgs couplings and lepton dipole moments. Here we begin an analysis of higher-order corrections in such models by setting up a renormalization scheme with full on-shell conditions on the lepton self energies, masses and fields. A minimal set of fundamental parameters is renormalized in the $\overline{\text{MS}}$ scheme. We provide a detailed discussion of lepton mixing and redundancies at higher orders, show how the relevant counterterms can be obtained from the renormalization conditions, and determine the $\beta$-functions corresponding to the scheme. As a first application we calculate the one-loop effective muon--Higgs coupling and analyse its correlation with the muon anomalous magnetic moment $\Delta a_{\mu }^{\text{VLL}}$. In the interesting case of large masses and opposite-sign coupling, the lowest-order correlation implies a fixed value of $\Delta a_{\mu }^{\text{VLL}}$ around $22.5\times 10^{-10}$, while the higher-order corrections significantly reduce this value to the interval $(\mathrm{10...18})\times 10^{-10}$.

    hep-phJHEP(2024)·3 citations
15. 15*

    Collider Tests of Flavored Resonant Leptogenesis in the $U(1{)}_X$ Model

    Garv Chauhan🇺🇸

    We study the generation of baryon asymmetry through the flavored resonant leptogenesis in the $U(1{)}_X$ extension of the Standard Model. Being a generalization of the $U(1{)}_{B\text{-}L}$, $U(1{)}_X$ is an ultraviolet-complete model of the right-handed neutrinos (RHNs), whose CP violating out-of-equilibrium decays lead to the generation of baryon asymmetry via leptogenesis. We can also explain the neutrino masses via the seesaw mechanism in this model. We consider three different cases for different $U(1{)}_X$ charges of the scalar particle responsible for $U(1{)}_X$ breaking at TeV-scale. These include the popular $U(1{)}_{B\text{-}L}$ and $U(1{)}_R$ models, as well as a $U(1{)}_C$ model which maximizes the collider signal. We numerically solve the flavored Boltzmann transport equations to calculate the total baryon asymmetry. We show that all three cases considered here can naturally explain the observed baryon asymmetry of the Universe in a large portion of the available parameter space, while satisfying the neutrino oscillation data. We find that the $U(1{)}_C$ case offers successful leptogenesis in a larger portion of the parameter space as compared to $U(1{)}_{B\text{-}L}$ and $U(1{)}_R$. We also perform a comparative study between the flavored and unflavored leptogenesis parameter space. Finally, we also study the collider prospects for all these scenarios using the lepton number violating signal of $pp\to {\ell }^{\pm }{\ell }^{\pm }+$jets mediated by the $Z^{\prime }$ boson associated with $U(1{)}_X$. We find that HL-LHC may be able to probe a small portion of the relevant parameter space having successful leptogenesis, if neutrinos have normal mass ordering, while a $\sqrt{s}=100$ TeV future collider can access a much larger region of the parameter space, thereby offering an opportunity to test resonant leptogenesis in the $U(1{)}_X$ model.

    hep-phNPB(2025)·6 citations
16. 16*

    Induced Domain Walls of QCD Axion, and Gravitational Waves

    Junseok Lee🇯🇵 · Kai Murai🇯🇵 · Fuminobu Takahashi🇯🇵 · Wen Yin🇯🇵

    We show that heavy axion domain walls induce domain walls of the QCD axion through a mixing between the heavy axion and the QCD axion, even when the pre-inflationary initial condition is assumed for the QCD axion. The induced domain walls arise because the effective $\theta$ parameter changes across the heavy axion domain walls, shifting the potential minimum of the QCD axion. When the heavy axion domain walls collapse, the induced QCD axion domain walls collapse as well. This novel mechanism for producing the QCD axions can explain dark matter even with the axion decay constant as small as $\mathcal{O}(10^9)$ GeV. In particular, this scenario requires domain wall collapse near the QCD crossover, potentially accounting for the stochastic gravitational wave background suggested by recent pulsar timing array observations, including NANOGrav. Using this mechanism, it is also possible to easily create induced domain walls for string axions or axions with a large decay constant, which would otherwise be challenging. We also comment on the implications for cosmic birefringence using induced axion domain walls.

    hep-phastro-ph.COJCAP(2024)·22 citations
17. 17*

    Non-universal probes of composite Higgs models: New bounds and prospects for FCC-ee

    Ben A. Stefanek🇬🇧

    We study the leading loop-level phenomenology of composite Higgs models via the effective field theory of a strongly interacting light Higgs and top quark (SILH+TQ). We systematically analyze the renormalization group evolution (RGE) of tree-generated operators in the SILH+TQ scenario, finding large mixings of flavor non-universal operators into those affecting electroweak precision observables. We show that these model-independent RG contributions are more important than typical estimates for finite matching terms. Flavor non-universal effects are completely captured by examining three options for the top mixing: fully composite $q_L^3$, equal compositeness, and fully composite $t_R$. In the most phenomenologically viable case of a fully composite $t_R$, we show that the strongest bound on the natural parameter space comes from a 2-loop double-log contribution of the 4-top operator $O_{tt}=({\bar{t}}_R{\gamma }_{\mu }{t}_R)({\bar{t}}_R{\gamma }^{\mu }{t}_R)$ into the Peskin-Takeuchi $T$ parameter. In general, we find that this 2-loop effect allows existing electroweak precision data to give better constraints on 4-top operators than high-energy probes from top production at the LHC. Independent of the top mixing, we find that a future tera-$Z$ machine such as FCC-ee has the potential to probe composite Higgs models up to a scale of $m_{\ast }\gtrsim 25$ TeV, and test the naturalness of the electroweak scale at the $\lesssim 10^{-4}$ level.

    hep-phJHEP(2024)·34 citations
18. 18*

    Triboson production in the SMEFT

    Eugenia Celada🇬🇧 · Gauthier Durieux🇧🇪 · Ken Mimasu🇬🇧 · Eleni Vryonidou🇬🇧

    We study the production of three electroweak gauge bosons at the LHC, in the effective field theory of the standard model, at dimension six and next-to-leading order in QCD. We present results for inclusive cross-sections and differential distributions, finding that these QCD corrections are large, often vary across the phase-space and notably differ from those observed in the standard model. We then explore the potential of the recently observed triboson production processes for improving the sensitivity brought by electroweak precision observables and diboson data. The additional sensitivity we observe is dominated by resonant Higgs boson contributions, with decays to photon pairs in particular. A global analysis including Higgs boson data is therefore needed for a fair assessment of the future reach of triboson measurements on heavy new physics.

    hep-phhep-exJHEP(2024)·12 citations
19. 19*

    Axion Interactions with Domain and Bubble Walls

    Isabel Garcia Garcia🇺🇸 · Rudin Petrossian-Byrne🇮🇹

    We show that interactions between axion-like particles (ALPs) and co-dimension one defects, such as phase-transition bubble walls and solitonic domain walls, can lead to important changes in the evolution of both walls and ALPs. The leading effect arises from the change in the ALP decay constant across the interface, which naturally follows from shift-symmetric interactions with the corresponding order parameter. Specifically, we show that for thin walls moving relativistically, an ALP background -- such as e.g. axion dark matter -- gives rise to a frictional force on the interface that is proportional to ${\gamma }^2$, with $\gamma$ the Lorentz factor of the wall, and that this effect is present in both the oscillating and frozen axion regimes. We explore the broader consequences of this effect for bubble and domain walls in the early universe, and show that this source of friction can be present even in the absent of a conventional medium such as radiation or matter. Possible implications include modifications to the dynamics of bubble and domain walls and their corresponding gravitational wave signatures, as well as the generation of a dark radiation component of ALPs in the form of ultra-relativistic `axion shells' with Lorentz factor ${\gamma }_{\text{shell}}\simeq 2{\gamma }^2\gg 1$ that may remain relativistic until the present day.

    hep-phastro-ph.COhep-thJHEP(2025)·4 citations
20. 20*

    Soft-gluon exchange matters: isotropic screening in QCD kinetic theory

    Kirill Boguslavski🇦🇹 · Florian Lindenbauer🇦🇹

    QCD kinetic theory simulations are a prominent tool for studying the nonequilibrium initial stages in heavy-ion collisions. Despite their success, all implementations rely on approximations of the hard thermal loop (HTL) screened matrix elements in the collision terms. In this paper, we present our results for different isotropic screening prescriptions in the elastic collision term for gluons. In particular, we go beyond the simple Debye-like screening form that is used in all current implementations and apply the isotropic HTL matrix element instead. For isotropic systems, the evolution is nearly unchanged, but when studying the equilibration process in a Bjorken expanding plasma, we find qualitative and quantitative differences in a range of moments of the distribution function, such as a decrease in the maximum pressure anisotropy by up to 50%. In contrast, we find no significant qualitative impact on the jet quenching parameter or on the late-time hydrodynamization dynamics of anisotropic plasmas but observe systematically smaller values of $\eta /s$ by about 10% that coincide with perturbative calculations at small couplings. Our study reveals that the choice of the screening prescription can lead to large corrections at early times, but is less important close to equilibrium.

    hep-phnucl-thPRD(2024)·16 citations
21. 21*

    A Phenomenological Analysis of LHC Neutrino Scattering at NLO Accuracy Matched to Parton Showers

    Melissa van Beekveld🇳🇱 · Silvia Ferrario Ravasio🇨🇭 · Eva Groenendijk🇳🇱 · Peter Krack🇳🇱 · Juan Rojo🇳🇱 · Valentina Schütze Sánchez🇳🇱

    We perform a detailed phenomenological study of high-energy neutrino deep inelastic scattering (DIS) focused on LHC far-forward experiments such as FASER$\nu$ and SND@LHC. To this aim, we parametrise the neutrino fluxes reaching these LHC far-forward experiments in terms of `neutrino PDFs' encoding their energy and rapidity dependence by means of the LHAPDF framework. We integrate these neutrino PDFs in the recently developed POWHEG-BOX-RES implementation of neutrino-induced DIS to produce predictions accurate at next-to-leading order (NLO) in the QCD coupling matched to parton showers (PS) with Pythia8. We present NLO+PS predictions for final-state distributions within the acceptance of FASER$\nu$ and SND@LHC as well as for two experiments of the proposed Forward Physics Facility (FPF), FASER$\nu$2 and FLArE. We quantify the impact of NLO QCD corrections, of the parton showering and hadronisation settings in Pythia8, of the QED shower, and of the incoming neutrino flavour for the description of these observables, and compare our predictions with the GENIE neutrino event generator. Our work demonstrates the relevance of modern higher-order event generators to achieve the key scientific targets of the LHC neutrino experiments.

    hep-phhep-exEPJC(2024)·16 citations
22. 22*

    Flavor-Specific Dark Matter Signatures through the Lens of Neutrino Oscillations

    Subhaditya Bhattacharya🇮🇳 · Sven Fabian🇩🇪 · Johannes Herms🇩🇪 · Sudip Jana🇩🇪

    We investigate the flavor-specific properties of leptophilic dark matter in neutrino mass models, where dark matter signals are directly correlated with the neutrino oscillation data, providing complementary insights into the neutrino mass hierarchy and CP phases. Notably, this can be accomplished without introducing a flavor-specific portal to dark matter, imposing any new flavor symmetry, or involving flavon fields. As a case study, we analyze the correlation between the flavor-philic nature of dark matter and neutrino oscillation data in the type-II seesaw and Zee-Babu models, and extend this discussion to other neutrino mass models. We analyze the indirect signatures of such leptophilic dark matter, specifically examining the spectrum of the cosmic ray electron/positron flux resulting from the pair annihilation of dark matter in the Galactic halo, and explore correlated lepton-specific signals at collider experiments sensitive to neutrino oscillation data.

    hep-phJCAP(2025)·1 citation
23. 23*

    TCC in the interior of moduli space and its implications for the string landscape and cosmology

    Alek Bedroya🇺🇸 · Qianshu Lu🇺🇸 · Paul Steinhardt🇺🇸

    We consider the classical Friedmann-Robertson-Walker solutions that describe a universe undergoing a transition from an accelerating expansion phase in the past to an eternal decelerating expansion phase in the future, driven by a scalar field evolving in a potential energy landscape. We show that any solution for which the accelerating phase violates the Trans-Planckian Censorship Conjecture (TCC), even in the interior of moduli space, never approaches the asymptotic vacuum with zero particles. Based on the assumption that the effective field theory must be valid for the vacuum on the asymptotic boundary, as motivated by holography and string theory, we argue that (multi-field) scalar potentials with such solutions are disallowed, thus strengthening the case for TCC. In particular, the results imply a new set of complex and highly-nonlinear constraints across the entire string landscape which may make realizing inflation impossible.

    ↳ hep-thastro-ph.COgr-qchep-phJHEP(2025)·20 citations
24. 24*

    Self-dualities and Galois symmetries in Feynman integrals

    Sebastian Pögel🇩🇪 · Xing Wang🇩🇪 · Stefan Weinzierl🇩🇪 · Konglong Wu🇩🇪 · Xiaofeng Xu🇩🇪

    It is well-known that all Feynman integrals within a given family can be expressed as a finite linear combination of master integrals. The master integrals naturally group into sectors. Starting from two loops, there can exist sectors made up of more than one master integral. In this paper we show that such sectors may have additional symmetries. First of all, self-duality, which was first observed in Feynman integrals related to Calabi--Yau geometries, often carries over to non-Calabi--Yau Feynman integrals. Secondly, we show that in addition there can exist Galois symmetries relating integrals. In the simplest case of two master integrals within a sector, whose definition involves a square root $r$, we may choose a basis $(I_1,I_2)$ such that $I_2$ is obtained from $I_1$ by the substitution $r\to -r$. This pattern also persists in sectors, which a priori are not related to any square root with dependence on the kinematic variables. We show in several examples that in such cases a suitable redefinition of the integrals introduces constant square roots like $\sqrt{3}$. The new master integrals are then again related by a Galois symmetry, for example the substitution $\sqrt{3}\to -\sqrt{3}$. To handle the case where the argument of a square root would be a perfect square we introduce a limit Galois symmetry. Both self-duality and Galois symmetries constrain the differential equation.

    ↳ hep-thhep-phmath-phmath.MPJHEP(2024)·22 citations
25. 25*

    String Geometry Theory and The String Vacuum

    Matsuo Sato🇯🇵

    String geometry theory is a candidate of the non-perturvative formulation of string theory. In this theory, strings constitute not only particles but also the space-time. In this review, we identify perturbative vacua, and derive the path-integrals of all order perturbative strings on the corresponding string backgrounds by considering the fluctuations around the vacua. On the other hand, the most dominant part of the path-integral of string geometry theory is the zeroth order part in the fluctuation of the action, which is obtained by substituting the perturbative vacua to the action. This part is identified with the effective potential of the string backgrounds and obtained explicitly. The global minimum of the potential is the string vacuum. The urgent problem is to find the global minimum. We introduce both analytical and numerical methods to solve it.

    ↳ hep-thgr-qchep-phmath.DG+1PoS(2024)·0 citations
26. 26*

    High-precision analysis of the critical point in heavy-quark QCD at $N_t=6$

    Ryo Ashikawa🇯🇵 · Masakiyo Kitazawa🇯🇵 · Shinji Ejiri🇯🇵 · Kazuyuki Kanaya🇯🇵

    Binder-cumulant analysis of the critical point in the heavy-quark region of QCD is performed by Monte-Carlo simulations with the hopping-parameter expansion at $N_t=6$. We extend our previous analysis at $N_t=4$ to finer lattices and perform high-precision analyses on large spatial volumes up to the aspect ratio $LT=N_s/N_t=18$. Higher order terms in the hopping-parameter expansion are incorporated effectively up to 14th order. The numerical results show that the violation of the finite-size scaling becomes more prominent on the finer lattice at a given aspect ratio.

    ↳ hep-lathep-phnucl-thPRD(2024)·13 citations
27. 27*

    Understanding the approach to thermalization from the eigenspectrum of non-Abelian gauge theories

    Harshit Pandey🇮🇳 · Ravi Shanker🇮🇳 · Sayantan Sharma🇮🇳

    We study some interesting aspects of the spectral properties of SU(3) gauge theory, both with and without dynamical quarks (QCD) at thermal equilibrium using lattice gauge theory techniques. By calculating the eigenstates of a massless overlap Dirac operator on the gauge configurations, we implement a gauge-invariant method to study spectral properties of non-Abelian gauge theories. We have unambiguously categorized Dirac eigenvalues into different regimes based on a quantity defined in terms of the ratios of nearest neighbor spacings. While majority of these eigenstates below the magnetic scale are similar to those of random matrices belonging to the Gaussian Unitary ensemble at temperatures much higher than the chiral crossover transition in QCD, a few among them start to become prominent only near the crossover. These form fractal-like clusters with the median value for their fractal dimensions hinting at the universality class of the chiral transition in QCD. We further demonstrate that momentum modes below the magnetic scale in a particular non-equilibrium state of QCD are classically chaotic and estimate an upper bound on the thermalization time $\sim 1.44$ fm/c by matching this magnetic scale with that of a thermal state at $\sim 600$ MeV.

    ↳ hep-latcond-mat.stat-mechhep-phnucl-ex+1NPB(2026)·10 citations
28. 28*

    Strangeness-Correlations on the pseudo-critical line in (2+1)-flavor QCD

    D. Bollweg🇺🇸 · H.-T. Ding🇨🇳 · J. Goswami🇯🇵 · F. Karsch🇩🇪 · Swagato Mukherjee🇺🇸 · P. Petreczky🇺🇸 · C. Schmidt🇩🇪

    We present some lattice QCD results on first (${\chi }_1^i$) and second (${\chi }_2^i$) cumulants of and correlations (${\chi }_{11}^{ij}$) among net baryon-number ($B$), strangeness ($S$) and electric charge ($Q$) along the pseudo-critical line ($T_{pc}({\mu }_B)$) in the temperature ($T$)--baryon chemical potential (${\mu }_B$) phase diagram of (2+1)-flavor QCD. We point out that violations of the isospin symmetric limit of vanishing electric charge chemical potential are small along the $T_{pc}({\mu }_B)$ for the entire range of ${\mu }_B$ covered in the RHIC beam energy scan. For the strangeness neutral matter produced in heavy-ion collisions this leads to a close relation between ${\chi }_{11}^{BS}$ and ${\chi }_{11}^{QS}$. We compare lattice QCD results for ${\chi }_{11}^{BS}/{\chi }_2^S$ along the $T_{pc}({\mu }_B)$ line with preliminary experimental measurements of ${\chi }_{11}^{BS}/{\chi }_2^S$ for collision energies $7.7\mathrm{GeV}\le \sqrt{s_{{}_{NN}}}\le 62.4\mathrm{GeV}$. While we find good agreements for $\sqrt{s_{{}_{NN}}}\ge 39$~GeV, differences are sizeable at smaller values of $\sqrt{s_{{}_{NN}}}$. Moreover, we compare lattice QCD results for the ratio of the strangeness (${\mu }_S$) to baryon (${\mu }_B$) chemical potentials, which define a strangeness neutral system with fixed electric charge to baryon number density, with experimental results obtained by the STAR collaboration for ${\mu }_S/{\mu }_B$ using strange baryon yields on the freeze-out line. Finally, we determine the baryon chemical potential at the freeze-out (${\mu }_B^f$) by comparing ${\chi }_1^B/{\chi }_2^B$ along the $T_{pc}({\mu }_B)$ with the experimentally measured net-proton cumulants ${\chi }_1^p/{\chi }_2^p$. We find that $\{{\mu }_B^f,T_{pc}({\mu }_B^f)\}$ are consistent with the freeze-out parameters of the statistical-model fits to experimentally measured hadron yields for $\sqrt{s_{{}_{NN}}}\ge 11.5$ GeV.

    ↳ hep-lathep-phPRD(2024)·21 citations
29. 29*

    Cosmic topology. Part IIIa. Microwave background parity violation without parity-violating microphysics

    Amirhossein Samandar🇺🇸 · Javier Carrón Duque🇪🇸 · Craig J. Copi🇺🇸 · Mikel Martin Barandiaran🇪🇸 · Deyan P. Mihaylov🇺🇸 · Thiago S. Pereira🇧🇷 · Glenn D. Starkman🇺🇸 · Yashar Akrami🇪🇸 · Stefano Anselmi🇮🇹 · Fernando Cornet-Gomez🇺🇸 · Johannes R. Eskilt🇳🇴 · Andrew H. Jaffe🇬🇧 · Arthur Kosowsky🇺🇸 · Andrius Tamosiunas (COMPACT Collaboration)🇺🇸

    The standard cosmological model, which assumes statistical isotropy and parity invariance, predicts the absence of correlations between even-parity and odd-parity observables of the cosmic microwave background (CMB). Contrary to these predictions, large-angle CMB temperature anomalies generically involve correlations between even-$\ell$ and odd-$\ell$ angular power spectrum $C_{\ell }$, while recent analyses of CMB polarization have revealed non-zero equal-$\ell$ $EB$ correlations. These findings challenge the conventional understanding, suggesting deviations from statistical isotropy, violations of parity, or both. Cosmic topology, which involves changing only the boundary conditions of space relative to standard cosmology, offers a compelling framework to potentially account for such parity-violating observations. Topology inherently breaks statistical isotropy, and can also break homogeneity and parity, providing a natural paradigm for explaining observations of parity-breaking observables without the need to add parity violation to the underlying microphysics. Our investigation delves into the harmonic space implications of topology for CMB correlations, using as an illustrative example $EB$ correlations generated by tensor perturbations under both parity-preserving and parity-violating scenarios. Consequently, these findings not only challenge the foundational assumptions of the standard cosmological model but also open new avenues for exploring the topological structure of the Universe through CMB observations.

    ↳ astro-ph.COgr-qchep-phhep-thJCAP(2024)·18 citations

* Reconstructed cohort: no mailing for this day survives in the archive. Papers are grouped by their submission times and arXiv's announcement cut-off, assuming announcement without delay; positions follow identifier order. Validated at ~91% exact-day agreement against the archived era.