A Fresh Look at Gauge Coupling Unification

Abstract

The apparent unification of gauge couplings around 10^16 GeV is one of the strong arguments in favor of Supersymmetric extensions of the Standard Model (SM). In this contribution a new analysis, using the latest experimental data, is performed. The strong coupling alpha_s emerges as the key factor for evaluating the results of the fits, as the experimental and theoretical uncertainties in its measurements are substantially higher than for the electromagnetic and weak couplings. The present analysis pays special attention to numerical and statistical details. The results, combined with the current limits on the supersymmetric particle masses, favor a value for the SUSY scale <~ 150 GeV and for alpha_s = 0.118-0.119.

Comments: 4 pages, 1 table, 1 figure; presented at the Meeting of the Division of Particles and Fields of the APS, Riverside, USA, August 2004