Related papers: Landscaping the Strong CP Problem
In this thesis, the implications of a new cosmological model are studied, which has features similar to that of decaying vacuum cosmologies. Decaying vacuum (or cosmological constant \Lambda) models are the results of attempts to resolve…
The cosmological constant problem is examined under the assumption that the extrinsic curvature of the space-time contributes to the vacuum. A compensation mechanism based on a variable cosmological term is proposed. Under a suitable…
We explore a toy model mechanism of geometric cancellation, alleviating the (classical) cosmological constant problem. To do so, we assume at primordial times that vacuum energy fuels an inflationary quadratic hilltop potential nonminimally…
Standard cosmology has long been plagued by a number of persistent problems. The origin of the apparent acceleration of the cosmic expansion remains enigmatic. The cosmological constant has been reintroduced as a free parameter with a value…
We briefly review the cases of forced and spontaneous chiral symmetry breaking. In particular the chiral condensate of q anti-q pairs is parametrized with two angles, phi which measures the chiral condensation, and theta which measures the…
In some cosmological theories with varying constants there are anthropic reasons why the expansion of the universe must not be too {\it close} to flatness or the cosmological constant too close to zero. Using exact theories which…
We apply a new self-tuning mechanism to the well-known Kachru-Kallosh-Linde-Trivedi (KKLT) model to address the cosmological constant problem. In this mechanism the cosmological constant $\lambda$ contains a supersymmetry breaking term…
The traditional "explanation" for the observed acceleration of the universe is the existence of a positive cosmological constant. However, this can hardly be a truly convincing explanation, as an expanding universe is not expected to have a…
In this paper we investigate possible solutions to the coincidence problem in flat phantom dark energy models with a constant dark energy equation of state and quintessence models with a linear scalar field potential. These models are…
It is well known that global symmetries protect local supersymmetry and a zero value for the cosmological constant in no--scale supergravity. A particular breakdown of these symmetries, which ensures the vanishing of the vacuum energy…
Under the assumption that the cosmological constant vanishes in the true ground state with lowest possible energy density, we argue that the observed small but finite vacuum-like energy density can be explained if we consider a theory with…
We show that models in which the strong $CP$ problem is solved by introducing an axion field with a mass enhanced by non-QCD UV dynamics at a scale $\Lambda_{\rm SI}$ exhibit enhanced sensitivity to external sources of $CP$ violation. In…
The Planck scale is usually believed to be an unpassable wall. Putting a cutoff there and thinking of it as a quantized spacetime entity shows that. However, this is exactly the cause of many problems in quantum gravity. The cosmological…
The cosmological constant and the Higgs mass seem unnaturally small and anthropically selected. We show that both can be efficiently scanned in Quantum Field Theories with a large enough number of vacua controllable thanks to approximated…
A huge value of cosmological constant characteristic for the particle physics and the inflation of early Universe are inherently related to each other: one can construct a fine-tuned superpotential, which produces a flat potential of…
A probable solution of the cosmological constant problem was recently found. We propose that dark energy of the Universe is vacuum energy. Our Universe during its expansion is spending its vacuum energy for creation of new quantum states,…
These lectures discuss the $\theta$ parameter of QCD. After an introduction to anomalies in four and two dimensions, the parameter is introduced. That such topological parameters can have physical effects is illustrated with two dimensional…
The role of Lorentz invariance as a fundamental symmetry of nature has been lately reconsidered in different approaches to quantum gravity. It is thus natural to study whether other puzzles of physics may be solved within these proposals.…
We investigate a controversial issue on the measure of CP violation in strong in teractions. In the presence of nontrivial topological gauge configurations, the $\theta$-term in QCD has a profound effect: it breaks the CP symmetry. The…
A particular compensation-type solution of the main cosmological constant problem has been proposed recently, with two massless vector fields dynamically canceling an arbitrary cosmological constant \Lambda. The naive expectation is that…