Related papers: Naturally Light Hidden Photons in LARGE Volume Str…
We reconsider the issue of large-volume compactifications of the heterotic string in light of the recent discoveries about strongly-coupled string theories. Our conclusion remains firmly negative with respect to classical compactifications…
In a non-perturbative gauge-invariant formulation of grand-unified theories all low energy vector states need to be composite with respect to the high-scale gauge group, including the photon. We investigate this by using lattice methods to…
We study the structure of cosmic strings produced at the breaking of an anomalous U(1) gauge symmetry present in many superstring compactification models. We show that their coupling with the axion necessary in order to cancel the anomalies…
In string compactifications, frequently there appears the anomalous U(1) gauge symmetry which belonged to E8$\times$E8 of the heterotic string. This anomalous U(1) gauge boson obtains mass at the compactification scale, just below…
Pseudoscalar particles, with almost zero mass and very weak coupling to the visible matter, arise in many extensions of the standard model of particle physics. Their mixing with photons in the presence of an external magnetic field leads to…
The capability of string theories to reproduce at low energy the observed pattern of quark and lepton masses and mixing angles is examined, focusing the attention on orbifold constructions, where the magnitude of Yukawa couplings depends on…
The direct detection of gravitational waves from binary mergers has been hailed as the discovery of the century. In the light of recent evidence on the existence of gravitational waves, it is now possible to know about the properties of…
Linear equivalence is a criterion that compares submanifolds in the same homology class. We show that, in the context of type II compactifications with D-branes, this concept translates to the kinetic mixing between U(1) gauge symmetries…
In the simplest compactification, we discuss the intermediate unification in M-theory on $S^1/Z_2$, and point out that we can push the eleven dimension Planck scale to the TeV range if the gauge coupling in the hidden sector is super weak,…
We study possible correlations between properties of the observable and hidden sectors in heterotic string theory. Specifically, we analyze the case of the Z6-II orbifold compactification which produces a significant number of models with…
We study the low-energy effective theories of photons and gravitons, matching them at one loop to a UV completion with a massive spinning matter particle. The matter is allowed to have non-minimal electromagnetic and gravitational…
Additional neutral gauge fermions -- "photini" -- arise in string compactifications as superpartners of U(1) gauge fields. Unlike their vector counterparts, the photini can acquire weak-scale masses from soft SUSY breaking and lead to…
There is a growing interest for the search of new light gauge bosons. The small mass of a new boson can turn various kinds of low-energy experiments to a new discovery machine, depending on their couplings to the standard model particles.…
New light hidden sector degrees of freedom represent one of the most approaches to going beyond the Standard Model. I give a short account of how such WISP candidates naturally appear in string compactifications and some descriptions of…
The discovery of an axion-like particle above the QCD line would rule out Grand Unified Theories, including the perturbative heterotic string with the Standard Model embedded in a single $E_8$ factor or $SO(32)$. In this work we study a…
Dark matter could be made up of dark photons, massive but very light particles whose interactions with matter resemble those of usual photons but suppressed by a small mixing parameter. We analyze the main approaches to dark photon…
Known mechanisms for breaking of supersymmetry at the level of string theory imply that at least one of the internal dimensions has a very large size. Experimental detection of the associated light Kaluza-Klein (KK) excitations would be a…
Some physicists hope to use string/M-theory to construct a comprehensive underlying theory of our physical world a "final theory". Can such a theory be tested? A quantum theory of gravity must be formulated in 10 dimensions, so obviously…
In presence of a magnetic field, photons can mix with any particle having a two-photon vertex. In theories with large compact extra-dimensions, there exists a hierachy of massive Kaluza-Klein gravitons that couple to any photon entering a…
The possibility that mirror matter with masses in the several hundred GeV- TeV range exists is explored. Mirror matter appears quite naturally in many unified models of particle interactions both in GUTs and in strings often in vector-like…