Related papers: Relaxion: A Landscape Without Anthropics
We develop a supersymmetric bi-axion model of high-scale inflation coupled to supergravity, in which the axionic structure originates from, and is protected by, gauge symmetry in an extra dimension. While local supersymmetry (SUSY) is…
It has been claimed that the electroweak vacuum may be unstable during inflation due to large fluctuations of order $H$ in case of a high inflationary scale as suggested by BICEP2. We compute the Standard Model Higgs effective potential…
In order to accommodate the QCD axion as the dark matter (DM) in a model in which the Peccei-Quinn (PQ) symmetry is broken before the end of inflation, a relatively low scale of inflation has to be invoked in order to avoid bounds from DM…
The Higgs field is an attractive candidate for the inflaton because it is an observationally confirmed fundamental scalar field. Importantly, it can be modeled by the most general renormalizable scalar potential. However, if the classical…
We propose a model for the QCD axion which is realized through a coupling of the Peccei-Quinn scalar field to magnetically charged fermions at high energies. We show that the axion of this model solves the strong CP problem and then…
Several theoretical motivations point to ultralight QCD axions with large decay constants $f_a \simeq \mathcal{O}(10^{16}-10^{17})$ GeV, to which experimental proposals are dedicated. This regime is known to face the problem of…
We explore the possibility that the fundamental theory of nature does not contain any scale. This implies a renormalizable quantum gravity theory where the graviton kinetic term has 4 derivatives, and can be reinterpreted as gravity minus…
Models of Gauge-Higgs unification in extra dimensions offer a very elegant playground where one can study electroweak symmetry breaking. The nicest feature is that gauge symmetry itself protects the Higgs potential from divergences, thus…
We heal the cosmological constant problem by means of a \emph{cancellation mechanism} that adopts a phase transition during which quantum fluctuations are eliminated. To this purpose, we propose that a generalized scalar (dark) matter field…
The present measurement of the standard model (SM) parameters suggests that the Higgs effective potential has a maximum at the intermediate scale, and the electroweak (EW) vacuum is not absolutely stable. The simplest possibility for…
We investigate the validity of effective field theory methods and the decoupling of heavy fields during inflation. Considering models of inflation in which the inflaton is coupled to a heavy (super-Hubble) degree of freedom initially in its…
Combining the quantum scale invariance with the absence of new degrees of freedom above the electroweak scale leads to stability of the latter against perturbative quantum corrections. Nevertheless, the hierarchy between the weak and the…
The $\Lambda$CDM model provides an excellent fit to the CMB data. However, a statistically significant tension emerges when its determination of the Hubble constant $H_0$ is compared to the local distance-redshift measurements. The…
We present a scenario where an axion-like field drives inflation until a potential barrier, which keeps a waterfall field at the origin, disappears and a waterfall transition occurs. Such a barrier separates the scale of inflation from that…
We explore the prospects for bounding the weak scale using the weak gravity conjecture (WGC), addressing the hierarchy problem by violating the expectations of effective field theory. Building on earlier work by Cheung and Remmen, we…
The hierarchy problem is associated with renormalization and decoupling. We can account for the smallness of the scalar mass against loop corrections and its insensitivity to ultraviolet physics through the decoupling of heavy fields. It is…
We present a new solution to the electroweak hierarchy problem. We introduce $N$ copies of the Standard Model with varying values of the Higgs mass parameter. This generically yields a sector whose weak scale is parametrically removed from…
The domain wall problem and the isocurvature problem restrict possible combinations of axion models and inflation models. In this paper, we considered a new mechanism which solves those problems by dynamics of multiple scalar fields…
A large hierarchy between the electroweak scale and virtually any new scale of beyond-Standard-Model physics is often claimed to be unnatural. Sometimes, the apparent disparity between the measured Higgs mass and the size of the typical…
Strong coupling in Higgs inflation at high energies hinders a joint description of inflation, reheating and low-energy dynamics. The situation may be improved with a proper UV completion of the model. A well-defined self-consistent way is…