Publications

Order by: publication date number of citations

• Axion-like particle as cold dark matter via the misalignment mechanism with PQ symmetry unbroken during inflation

  Pawel Kozow, Marek Olechowski

  SciPost Phys. Proc. 12, 038 (2023) · published 4 July 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  The QCD axion and axion-like particles (ALPs) are well motivated candidates for Cold Dark Matter (CDM). Such models may be divided into two classes depending on whether the associated Peccei-Quinn (PQ) symmetry is broken or not during inflation. The latter case is usually considered to be quite simple with relic density depending only on the corresponding decay constant and with no constraints from the known bounds on isocurvature perturbations. We will show that the situation is much more complicated. We will discuss conditions which should be fulfilled by ALP models with U(1) unbroken during inflation to be phenomenologically interesting.

• Dark matter or millisecond pulsars? A deep learning-based analysis of the Fermi Galactic Centre Excess

  Florian List, Nicholas L. Rodd, Geraint F. Lewis

  SciPost Phys. Proc. 12, 034 (2023) · published 4 July 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  The $\gamma$-ray Galactic Centre Excess (GCE) remains one of the few observed high-energy signals for which a dark matter (DM) origin is a plausible explanation. We present a deep learning-based analysis of the $\gamma$-ray sky in the Galactic Centre region, carefully accounting for the mathematical degeneracy between faint point-sources (PSs) such as millisecond pulsars (MSPs) and DM-like Poisson emission. Using recent models for the Galactic foregrounds, we find that relatively few bright PSs just below Fermi's detection threshold seem unlikely to explain the GCE, although we continue to find evidence for PSs. Looking ahead, further improvements in the modelling of the $\gamma$-ray sky will be crucial for distinguishing between a DM-like and point-like morphology of the signal.

• Ionization efficiency at sub-keV energies for crystals and noble liquids

  Youssef Sarkis, Alexis A. Aguilar-Arevalo, Juan Carlos D'Olivo

  SciPost Phys. Proc. 12, 008 (2023) · published 3 July 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We study the ionization and light yields produced by nuclear recoils at low energies in pure crystals and noble liquids in the context of Lindhard's integral equation, incorporating the effects of binding energy, improved modeling of the electronic stopping, and electronic straggling. We consider three different models for the electronic stopping power that incorporate Coulomb repulsion effects at low energies, and Bohr electronic stripping for high energies. Finally, we discuss possible new effects near threshold.

• Axions in the early universe

  Francesco D'Eramo

  SciPost Phys. Proc. 12, 005 (2023) · published 3 July 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  The Peccei-Quinn solution to the strong CP problem provides a motivated framework rich in cosmological consequence. Thermal axion production is unavoidable if there is a thermal bath at early times. Scattering and decay processes of bath particles can dump relativistic axions in the primordial plasma, and they can leave observable signatures in cosmological observables probing both the early and the late universe if produced with a significant abundance. We present recent and significant improvements for the calculation of the axion production rate for different scenarios and apply these results to predict the abundance of produced axions. Finally, we provide updated cosmological bounds on the QCD axion mass.

  1 citation

• Annual modulation of dark matter signals: Experimental results and new ideas

  Felix Kahlhoefer

  SciPost Phys. Proc. 12, 004 (2023) · published 3 July 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Direct detection experiments searching for the scattering of dark matter particles off nuclei expect an annual modulation in their event rate. In this presentation, I will review the theoretical predictions and the experimental status of the search for annual modulations, with a focus on ongoing and planned experiments using NaI detectors. In particular, I will discuss the interpretation of the DAMA signal and related model-building efforts.

• Dark matter bound states: A window into the early universe

  Juri Smirnov

  SciPost Phys. Proc. 12, 003 (2023) · published 3 July 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Despite significant experimental sensitivity to point-like, weakly interacting particles at the electroweak mass scale, dark matter has not been found yet. This could hint at a more complex dark sector with multiple states or composite dark particles, much like the complexity of the standard model. Currently, our experimental sensitivity to such scenarios is limited by a lack of theoretical understanding. The investigation of Dark Matter systems with unstable or stable bound states provides a playground that leads to the development of important tools needed for the understanding of dark sectors with complex phenomena and allows to experimentally test well-motivated DM scenarios.

  1 citation

• Exploring unsupervised top tagging using Bayesian inference

  Ezequiel Alvarez, Manuel Szewc, Alejandro Szynkman, Santiago A. Tanco, Tatiana Tarutina

  SciPost Phys. Core 6, 046 (2023) · published 28 June 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  Recognizing hadronically decaying top-quark jets in a sample of jets, or even its total fraction in the sample, is an important step in many LHC searches for Standard Model and Beyond Standard Model physics as well. Although there exists outstanding top-tagger algorithms, their construction and their expected performance rely on Montecarlo simulations, which may induce potential biases. For these reasons we develop two simple unsupervised top-tagger algorithms based on performing Bayesian inference on a mixture model. In one of them we use as the observed variable a new geometrically-based observable $\tilde{A}_{3}$, and in the other we consider the more traditional $\tau_{3}/\tau_{2}$ $N$-subjettiness ratio, which yields a better performance. As expected, we find that the unsupervised tagger performance is below existing supervised taggers, reaching expected Area Under Curve AUC $\sim 0.80-0.81$ and accuracies of about 69\% $-$ 75\% in a full range of sample purity. However, these performances are more robust to possible biases in the Montecarlo that their supervised counterparts. Our findings are a step towards exploring and considering simpler and unbiased taggers.

• Sifting composite from elementary models at FCCee and CePC

  Giacomo Cacciapaglia, Aldo Deandrea, Abhishek M. Iyer, Andres Pinto

  SciPost Phys. 14, 170 (2023) · published 26 June 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  New Physics models with either an elementary or composite origin are often associated with a similar imprint in a direct search at colliders, case in point being the production of a light pseudoscalar in association with a monochromatic photon from the decay of a Z boson at future $e+e-$ colliders. We exploit the correlation between the discovery of a signal in the Z decays and electroweak precision measurements as a tool to distinguish a composite model from an elementary scalar one. Our results offer an appealing and rich physics case for future colliders and demonstrate how a lepton collider at the Z mass can be a discovery machine for new physics in the Higgs sector.

• Statistical patterns of theory uncertainties

  Aishik Ghosh, Benjamin Nachman, Tilman Plehn, Lily Shire, Tim M. P. Tait, Daniel Whiteson

  SciPost Phys. Core 6, 045 (2023) · published 20 June 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  A comprehensive uncertainty estimation is vital for the precision program of the LHC. While experimental uncertainties are often described by stochastic processes and well-defined nuisance parameters, theoretical uncertainties lack such a description. We study uncertainty estimates for cross-section predictions based on scale variations across a large set of processes. We find patterns similar to a stochastic origin, with accurate uncertainties for processes mediated by the strong force, but a systematic underestimate for electroweak processes. We propose an improved scheme, based on the scale variation of reference processes, which reduces outliers in the mapping from leading order to next-to-leading-order in perturbation theory.

  1 citation

• $\nu$-flows: Conditional neutrino regression

  Matthew Leigh, John Andrew Raine, Knut Zoch, Tobias Golling

  SciPost Phys. 14, 159 (2023) · published 16 June 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We present $\nu$-Flows, a novel method for restricting the likelihood space of neutrino kinematics in high-energy collider experiments using conditional normalising flows and deep invertible neural networks. This method allows the recovery of the full neutrino momentum which is usually left as a free parameter and permits one to sample neutrino values under a learned conditional likelihood given event observations. We demonstrate the success of $\nu$-Flows in a case study by applying it to simulated semileptonic $t\bar{t}$ events and show that it can lead to more accurate momentum reconstruction, particularly of the longitudinal coordinate. We also show that this has direct benefits in a downstream task of jet association, leading to an improvement of up to a factor of 1.41 compared to conventional methods.

  3 citations