Engineering topics
Ellis, John
Publications and source records attributed to Ellis, John.
Metastable charged sparticles and the cosmological {sup 7}Li problem
We consider the effects of metastable charged sparticles on Big-Bang Nucleosynthesis (BBN), including bound-state reaction rates and chemical effects. We make a new analysis of the bound states of negatively-charged massive particles with the light nuclei most prominent in BBN, and present a new code to track their abundances, paying particular attention to that of {sup 7}Li. Assuming, as an example, that the gravitino is the lightest supersymmetric particle (LSP), and that the lighter stau slepton, τ-tilde {sub 1}, is the metastable next-to-lightest sparticle within the constrained minimal supersymmetric extension of the Standard Model (CMSSM), we analyze the possible effects on the standard BBN abundances of τ-tilde {sub 1} bound states and decays for representative values of the gravitino mass. Taking into account the constraint on the CMSSM parameter space imposed by the discovery of the Higgs boson at the LHC, we delineate regions in which the fit to the measured light-element abundances is as good as in standard BBN. We also identify regions of the CMSSM parameter space in which the bound state properties, chemistry and decays of metastable charged sparticles can solve the cosmological {sup 7}Li problem.
Searching for particle physics beyond the standard model at the LHC and elsewhere
Following a general introduction to open questions beyond the Standard Model, the prospects for addressing them in the new era opened up by the LHC are reviewed. Sample highlights are given of ways in which the LHC is already probing beyond previous experiments, including the searches for supersymmetry, quark and gluon substructure and microscopic black holes.
A Historical Profile of the Higgs Boson
The Higgs boson was postulated in 1964, and phenomenological studies of its possible production and decays started in the early 1970s, followed by studies of its possible productionin e{sup +} e{sup -}, {anti p}p and pp collisions, in particular. Until recently, the most sensitive searches for the Higgs boson were at LEP between 1989 and 2000, which have been complemented bysearches at the Fermilab Tevatron. The LHC has recently entered the hunt, excluding a Higgs boson over a large range of masses and revealing a tantalizing hint in the range 119 to125 GeV, and there are good prospects that the existence or otherwise of the Higgs boson will soon be established. One of the most attractive possibilities is that the Higgs bosonis accompanied by supersymmetry, though composite options have yet to be excluded. This article reviews some of the key historical developments in Higgs physics over the past half-century.
Role of space-time foam in breaking supersymmetry via the Barbero-Immirzi parameter
We discuss how: (i) a dilaton/axion superfield can play the role of a Barbero-Immirzi field in four-dimensional conformal quantum supergravity theories, (ii) a fermionic component of such a dilaton/axion superfield may play the role of a Goldstino in the low-energy effective action obtained from a superstring theory with F-type global supersymmetry breaking, (iii) this global supersymmetry breaking is communicated to the gravitational sector via the supergravity coupling of the Goldstino, and (iv) such a scenario may be realized explicitly in a D-foam model with D-particle defects fluctuating stochastically.
Galactic-centre gamma rays in CMSSM dark matter scenarios
We study the production of γ rays via LSP annihilations in the core of the Galaxy as a possible experimental signature of the constrained minimal supersymmetric extension of the Standard Model (CMSSM), in which supersymmetry-breaking parameters are assumed to be universal at the GUT scale, assuming also that the LSP is the lightest neutralino χ. The part of the CMSSM parameter space that is compatible with the measured astrophysical density of cold dark matter is known to include a (τ-tilde {sub 1})−χ coannihilation strip, a focus-point strip where χ has an enhanced Higgsino component, and a funnel at large tan β where the annihilation rate is enhanced by the poles of nearby heavy MSSM Higgs bosons, A/H. We calculate the total annihilation rates, the fractions of annihilations into different Standard Model final states and the resulting fluxes of γ rays for CMSSM scenarios along these strips. We observe that typical annihilation rates are much smaller in the coannihilation strip for tan β = 10 than along the focus-point strip or for tan β = 55, and that the annihilation branching ratios differ greatly between the different dark matter strips. Whereas the current Fermi-LAT data are not sensitive to any of the CMSSM scenarios studied, and the calculated γ-ray fluxes are probably unobservably low along the coannihilation strip for tan β = 10, we find that substantial portions of the focus-point strips and rapid-annihilation funnel regions could be pressured by several more years of Fermi-LAT data, if understanding of the astrophysical background and/or systematic uncertainties can be improved in parallel.
Neutrino Fluxes from NUHM LSP Annihilations in the Sun
We extend our previous studies of the neutrino fluxes expected from neutralino LSP annihilations inside the Sun to include variants of the minimal supersymmetric extension of the Standard Model (MSSM) with squark, slepton and gaugino masses constrained to be universal at the GUT scale, but allowing one or two non-universal supersymmetry-breaking parameters contributing to the Higgs masses (NUHM1,2). As in the constrained MSSM (CMSSM) with universal Higgs masses, there are large regions of the NUHM parameter space where the LSP density inside the Sun is not in equilibrium, so that the annihilation rate may be far below the capture rate, and there are also large regions where the capture rate is not dominated by spin-dependent LSP-proton scattering. The spectra possible in the NUHM are qualitatively similar to those in the CMSSM. We calculate neutrino-induced muon fluxes above a threshold energy of 10 GeV, appropriate for the IceCube/DeepCore detector, for points where the NUHM yields the correct cosmological relic density for representative choices of the NUHM parameters. We find that the IceCube/DeepCore detector can probe regions of the NUHM parameter space in addition to analogues of the focus-point strip and the tip of the coannihilation strip familiar from the CMSSM. These include regions with enhanced Higgsino-gaugino mixing in the LSP composition, that occurs where neutralino mass eigenstates cross over. On the other hand, rapid-annihilation funnel regions in general yield neutrino fluxes that are unobservably small.
Constrained Sypersymmetric Flipped SU (5) GUT Phenomenology
We explore the phenomenology of the minimal supersymmetric flipped SU(5) GUT model (CFSU(5)), whose soft supersymmetry-breaking (SSB) mass parameters are constrained to be universal at some input scale, Min, above the GUT scale, M{sub GUT}. We analyze the parameter space of CFSU(5) assuming that the lightest supersymmetric particle (LSP) provides the cosmological cold dark matter, paying careful attention to the matching of parameters at the GUT scale. We first display some specific examples of the evolutions of the SSB parameters that exhibit some generic features. Specifically, we note that the relationship between the masses of the lightest neutralino {chi} and the lighter stau {tilde {tau}}{sub 1} is sensitive to M{sub in}, as is the relationship between m{sub {chi}} and the masses of the heavier Higgs bosons A,H. For these reasons, prominent features in generic (m{sub 1/2}, m{sub 0}) planes such as coannihilation strips and rapid-annihilation funnels are also sensitive to Min, as we illustrate for several cases with tan {beta} = 10 and 55. However, these features do not necessarily disappear at large Min, unlike the case in the minimal conventional SU(5) GUT. Our results are relatively insensitive to neutrino masses.