Related papers: Axion string signatures II: A cosmological plasma …
Cosmic strings are one-dimensional topological defects which could have been formed in the early stages of our Universe. They triggered a lot of interest, mainly for their cosmological implications: they could offer an alternative to…
Recent observations from the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) have uncovered an unexpectedly large abundance of massive, UV-bright galaxies at high redshifts, presenting a significant challenge to established galaxy formation models within…
In the wide variety of axion cosmologies in which axion strings form, their radiative decay is the dominant mechanism for the production of axions, imposing a tight constraint on the axion mass. Here, we focus on the mechanism by which…
I report on recent numerical simulations of the simplest field theory with cosmic string solutions, the Abelian Higgs model. We find that random networks of string quickly converge to a scaling solution in which the network scale length…
Most embeddings of the Standard Model into a more unified theory, in particular the ones based on supergravity or superstrings, predict the existence of a hidden sector of particles which have only very weak interactions with the visible…
The static stationary axially symmetric background ("infinite cosmic string") of the $D=4$ string theory provided with an axion charge is studied in the effective theory approach. The most general exact solution is constructed. It is found…
Cosmic strings are topological defects possibly formed in the early Universe, which may be observable due to their gravitational effects on the cosmic microwave background radiation or gravitational wave experiments. To this effect it is…
The serious cosmological problems created by the axion-string/axion-domain-wall system in standard axion models are alleviated by positing the existence of a new confining force. The instantons of this force can generate an axion potential…
In most of the models of hadronic collisions the number of exchanged colour strings grows with energy and atomic numbers of the projectile and target. At high string densities interaction between them should melt them into the quark-gluon…
We examine high-density axion clusters under gravitational compression. These are transient events in which the majority of axions are rapidly converted into photons, with some configurations producing photon signals with distinctive and…
We show that stable local cosmic strings are a generic prediction of supersymmetric models where supersymmetry is broken at scales within a few orders of magnitude of the weak scale and is fed down to the observable sector by gauge…
We consider cosmological consequences of the spontaneous breaking of a global symmetry that is anomalous under technicolor interactions, leading to the emergence of a light axion-like particle. Avoiding overclosure of the universe by such…
Within two specific string cosmology scenarios --differing in the way the pre- and post-big bang phases are joined-- we compute the size and spectral slope of various types of cosmologically amplified quantum fluctuations that arise in…
Cosmic strings, topological defects predicted by high-energy theories, may contribute to the late-time expansion of the Universe, effectively mimicking dynamical dark energy. We investigate four phenomenological extensions of the…
We investigate the cosmological constraints on axion models where the domain wall number is greater than one. In these models, multiple domain walls attached to strings are formed, and they survive for a long time. Their annihilation occurs…
Motivated UV frameworks generically predict the existence of multiple axion fields. Their interplay gives rise to novel collective phenomena - including level crossings and the formation of string bundles - which modify the predicted mass…
Cosmological evolution of axionic strings is investigated by numerically solving field equations of a complex scalar field in 3+1 dimensions. It is shown that the global strings relax to the scaling solution with a significantly smaller…
Axion-like particles are hypothetical new light (sub-eV) bosons predicted in some extensions of the Standard Model of particle physics. In astrophysical environments comprising high-energy gamma rays and turbulent magnetic fields, the…
Ultra-light axions (ULAs) with masses in the range 10^{-33} eV <m <10^{-20} eV are motivated by string theory and might contribute to either the dark-matter or dark-energy density of the Universe. ULAs could suppress the growth of structure…
A compelling production mechanism for QCD axion dark matter is from the scaling dynamics of early universe axion strings. We show that in DFSZ-like models containing tree-level interactions between fermions and the axion, friction between…