Related papers: Cosmic strings in the complex symmetron model
Cosmic strings can arise in hidden sector models with a spontaneously broken Abelian symmetry group. We have studied the couplings of the Standard Model fields to these so-called dark strings in the companion paper. Here we survey the…
We describe the detailed study and results of high-resolution numerical simulations of string-induced structure formation in open universes and those with a non-zero cosmological constant. The effect from small loops generated from the…
Local cosmic strings solutions are introduced in a model with a pseudo-anomalous U(1) gauge symmetry. Such a symmetry is present in many superstring compactification models. The coupling of those strings with the axion necessary in order to…
Motivated in part by string theory, we consider a modification of the LambdaCDM cosmological model in which the dark matter has a long-range scalar force screened by light particles. Scalar forces can have interesting effects on structure…
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…
In hidden sector models with an extra U(1) gauge group, new fields can interact with the Standard Model only through gauge kinetic mixing and the Higgs portal. After the U(1) is spontaneously broken, these interactions couple the resultant…
Scalar fields, strongly coupled to matter, can be present in nature and still be invisible to local experiments if they are subject to a screening mechanism. The symmetron is one such mechanism which relies on restoration of a spontaneously…
Motivated by astrophysical observations of excess electronic production in the galaxy, new theoretical models of the dark matter sector have been proposed in which the Standard model couples to the dark matter sector through an attractive…
The topic of cosmic strings provides a bridge between the physics of the very small and the very large. They are predicted by some unified theories of particle interactions. If they exist, they may help to explain some of the largest-scale…
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…
Cosmic strings are linear concentrations of energy that form whenever phase transitions in the early universe break axial symmetries as originally shown by Kibble. They are the result of frustrated order in the quantum fields responsible…
Recent cosmological data favour phantom-crossing dark energy, motivating models with non-minimal couplings that induce a fifth force on structure formation. Reconciling these models with local tests often requires strong screening, leading…
The properties of cosmic strings have been investigated in detail for their implications in early-universe cosmology. Although many variations of the basic structure have been discovered, with implications for both the microscopic and…
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…
Recent astrophysical observations have motivated novel theoretical models of the dark matter sector. A class of such models predicts the existence of GeV scale cosmic strings that communicate with the standard model sector by Aharonov-Bohm…
We describe the results of high-resolution numerical simulations of string-induced structure formation in open universes and those with a non-zero cosmological constant. For models with $\Gamma = \Omega h = 0.1 - 0.2$ and a cold dark matter…
We consider the Standard Model extended by a hidden sector U(1)_X symmetry that is spontaneously broken at the TeV scale by the vacuum expectation value of an additional scalar field. We study "dark string" solutions in this model and their…
The main goal of this work is to pursue an investigation of cosmic string configurations focusing on possible consequences of the Lorentz-symmetry breaking by a background vector. We analyze the possibility of cosmic strings as a viable…
The stability of "visible" electroweak-type cosmic strings is investigated in an extension of the Standard Model (SM) by a minimal dark sector, consisting of a U(1) gauge field, broken spontaneously by a scalar. The "visible" and dark…
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…