Related papers: The shadow of dark matter as a shadow of string th…
We consider a cosmic string moving through a gas of superfluid dark matter (SFDM) particles and analyze how it affects the dark matter distribution. We look at two different cases: first, a cosmic string passing through an already condensed…
A general concept of potential field is introduced. The potential field that one puts in correspondence with dark matter, has fundamental geometrical interpretation (parallel transport) and has intrinsically inherent in local symmetry. The…
The search for cosmic strings has been of renewed interest with the advent of precision cosmology. In this note we give a quantitative description of the nonlinear matter density fluctuations that can form from a scaling network of cosmic…
By combining swampland conjectures with observational data, it was recently suggested that the cosmological hierarchy problem (i.e. the smallness of the dark energy in Planck units) could be understood as an asymptotic limit in field space,…
Dipolar Dark Matter (DDM) is an alternative model motivated by the challenges faced by the standard cold dark matter model to describe the right phenomenology at galactic scales. A promising realisation of DDM was recently proposed in the…
Most of the mass of ordinary matter has its origin from quantum chromodynamics (QCD). A similar strong dynamics, dark QCD, could exist to explain the mass origin of dark matter. Using infrared fixed points of the two gauge couplings, we…
We revisit a set of dark sector models, motivated by anomalies observed in $B$ decays and the muon anomalous magnetic moment, in the light of a recently reported diphoton excess around 750$\,$GeV. Interpreting the excess as a scalar…
I emphasize analogy between Dp-branes in string theories and solitons in gauge theories comparing their common properties and showing differences. We will show that for certain excitations of the string/D3-brane system Neumann boundary…
We study the effects of superfluid dark matter on the structure of a cosmic string wake, considering both the effects of regular and quantum pressure terms. We consider the total fluid to consist of a combination of baryons and dark matter.…
The problem of dark energy arises due to its self-gravitating properties. Therefore explaining vacuum energy may become a question for the realm of quantum gravity, that can be addressed within string theory context. In this talk I…
Flat directions are a generic feature of the scalar potential in supersymmetric gauge field theories. They can arise, for example, from D-terms associated with an extra abelian gauge symmetry. Even when supersymmetry is broken softly, there…
We consider a simple supersymmetric hidden sector: pure SU(N) gauge theory. Dark matter is made up of hidden glueballinos with mass $m_X$ and hidden glueballs with mass near the confinement scale $\Lambda$. For $m_X \sim 1\,\text{TeV}$ and…
A simple and well-motivated explanation for the origin of dark matter is that it consists of thermal relic particles that get their mass entirely through electroweak symmetry breaking. The simplest models implementing this possibility…
The mixing of graviphotons and dark brane photons to the Standard Model hypercharge is analyzed in full generality, in weakly-coupled string theory. Both the direct mixing as well as effective terms that provide mixing after inclusion of SM…
We discuss the geometry of the Ramond-Ramond fields of low degree via the language of abelian p-gerbes, working in type II superstring theory with vanishing H-flux. A Dp-brane is a source for the Ramond-Ramond field strength G_(p+2), which…
Axions arise in many theoretical extensions of the Standard Model of particle physics, in particular the "string axiverse". If the axion masses, $m_a$, and (effective) decay constants, $f_a$, lie in specific ranges, then axions contribute…
In this talk, I will discuss the mechanism of nonthermal production of the neutralino cold dark matter from the decay of cosmic strings and the embedded defects, the $\pi$ and $\eta^\prime$ strings in the strong interaction sector of the…
We show that a scalar field without a kinetic term in the Lagrangian density, coupled to the covariant divergence of the torsion vector in the Einstein$-$Cartan theory of gravity, becomes kinetic in its general-relativistic equivalent…
In the presence of background Neveu-Schwarz flux, the description of the Ramond-Ramond fields of type IIB string theory using twisted K-theory is not compatible with S-duality. We argue that other possible variants of twisted K-theory would…
We discuss the idea that the model-independent (MI) axion of string theory is the source of quintessential dark energy. The scenario is completed with a composite QCD axion from hidden sector squark condensation that could serve as dark…