Flavor democracy and quark mass matrices

Based on experimental mass hierarchy, a set of flavor-democratic (FD) quark mass matrices at low energies is discussed. The model predicts CP violation parameters $J_{CP}=(0.3 \pm 0.2) 10^{-4}$ and ${\epsilon'/\epsilon} = (0.6 \pm 0.5) 10^{-3}$. However, this simple FD model also predicts a physical top quark mass not much higher than 100 GeV. As a next step, we assume that the Standard Model (SM) breaks down around some high energy $\Lambda$, and is replaced by a new FD flavor gauge theory (FGT). This possibility can be investigated by studying renormalization group equations for the Yukawa couplings of the SM with two Higgs doublets for various $m_t$ and VEV ratios $v_U/v_D$. With appropriate flavor-democratic boundary conditions at $\Lambda_{FGT}$, bounds on masses of top quark and tau-neutrino are derived, which are compatible with experimental bounds.