Related papers: REMOVING THE COSMOLOGICAL BOUND ON THE AXION SCALE
Although all interactions in the Standard Model generate nonzero shifts of the vacuum energy and pressure, gravity does not interact with them. Assuming (i) that the reason why it is so breaks down at some scale $M_g$ and that (ii) the…
It is often the case that scalar fields are produced in the early Universe in the form of coherent oscillation. These scalar fields may have huge abundances and affect the evolution of the Universe. In particular, if the lifetime is long…
A large value of the cosmological constant (CC) is induced in the Standard Model (SM) of Elementary Particle Physics because of Spontaneous Symmetry Breaking. To provide a small value of the observable CC one has to introduce the vacuum…
We derive model-independent quantization conditions on the axion couplings (sometimes known as the anomaly coefficients) to the Standard Model gauge group $[SU(3)\times SU(2)\times U(1)_Y]/\mathbb{Z}_q$ with $q=1,2,3,6$. Using these…
In the effective field theory framework, we consider the effect of supersymmetry breaking via gaugino condensation and supergravity in the hidden sector gauge group on the hidden sector vacuum angle $\theta_h$. The $\theta_h$ parameter…
We study the cosmological evolution of the QCD axion coupled to hidden photons. For a moderately strong coupling, the motion of the axion field leads to an explosive production of hidden photons by tachyonic instability. We use lattice…
Non-Abelian gauge fields are traditionally not coupled to torsion due to violation of gauge invariance. However, it is possible to couple torsion to Yang-Mills fields while maintaining gauge invariance provided one accepts that the gauge…
We show that the presence of a temporal electromagnetic field on cosmological scales generates an effective cosmological constant which can account for the accelerated expansion of the universe. Primordial electromagnetic quantum…
One of the simplest ways to account for the observed W-boson mass shift is to introduce the $SU(2)_L$ triplet Higgs boson with zero hypercharge, whose vacuum expectation value is about 3 GeV. If the triplet is heavy enough at…
Non-invertible global symmetry often predicts degeneracy in axion potentials and carries important information about the global form of the gauge group. When these symmetries are spontaneously broken they can lead to the formation of stable…
We argue that scale invariance is not anomalous in quantum field theory, provided it is broken cosmologically. We consider a locally scale invariant extension of the Standard Model of particle physics and argue that it fits both the…
We generalize the standard model of particle physics such it displays global scale invariance. The gravitational action is also suitably modified such that it respects this symmetry. This model is interesting since the cosmological constant…
The baryon asymmetry of the universe may be explained by rotations of the QCD axion in field space and baryon number violating processes. We consider the minimal extension of the Standard Model by a non-Abelian gauge interaction, $SU(2)_R$,…
Superstring theory, models with extra dimensions and other SUSY models generically predict that the coupling constants are in fact vacuum expectation values of fields like the dilaton, moduli etc. Assuming some of these fields are light…
We study the QCD axion arising from the 5th component of a bulk $U(1)$ gauge field in a five-dimensional warped grand unified theory, and determine the viable range of the axion decay constant $f_a$. Unlike flat extra dimensions, where…
We present a novel theory of the very early universe which addresses the traditional horizon and flatness problems of big bang cosmology and predicts a scale invariant spectrum of perturbations. Unlike inflation, this scenario requires no…
We argue that theories with multiple axions generically contain a large number of vacua that can account for the smallness of the cosmological constant. In a theory with N axions, the dominant instantons with charges Q determine the…
Quantum gravity can determine the dependence of gauge couplings in a scalar field, which is related to possible fifth forces and time varying fundamental "constants". This prediction is based on the scaling solution of functional flow…
A general no-go theorem dampens hope that the cosmological constant problem can be solved by a local symmetry mechanism. The possibility is considered here that this no-go theorem can be avoided by a pseudo-symmetry. A simple macroscopic…
Current cosmological data seem to show that dark energy is evolving in time and that it possibly crossed the phantom divide in the past. So far the only theories that lead to such a behavior involve a non-trivial coupling between dark…