Neutrino mass and new light gauge boson in superstring models

The proposal that the neutrino owes the smallness of its mass to the spontaneous breaking of R parity in superstring models with an additional gauge boson coupled to the right-handed neutrino is analysed. The right-handed neutrino can not in general decouple from the low-energy theory in models with supersymmetry at the TeV scale and which possess the light Higgs doublets necessary for generating fermion masses. Experimental limits on neutrino mass then imply an upper limit on the new gauge boson mass m_Zr ⪅ 220 GeV.     

Study of the violation of parity in nuclear β-decay via a relative β-polarization measurement with polarized107In nuclei

The first measurements of the longitudinal polarization of positrons emitted by polarized¹⁰⁷In are reported. The positron polarization is deduced from the time-resolved decay spectrum of positronium hyerfine states. Our result is in agreement with the standard electroweak model and provides a new lower limit for the mass of an eventual, predominantly right-handed charged W gauge boson of 220 GeV/c ².Also at Université Catholique de Louvain.     

Constraint on parity-violating muonic forces

Using the nonobservance of missing mass events in the leptonic kaon decay K→μX, we place a strong constraint on exotic parity-violating gauge interactions of the right-handed muon. By way of illustration, we apply it to an explanation of the proton size anomaly that invokes such a new force; scenarios in which the gauge boson decays invisibly or is long lived are constrained.     

Decay and decoupling of heavy right-handed Majorana neutrinos in the L–R model

Heavy right-handed neutrinos are of current interest. The interactions and decay of such neutrinos determine their decoupling epoch during the evolution of the universe. This in turn affects various observable features like the energy density, nucleosynthesis, CMBR spectrum, galaxy formation and baryogenesis. Here, we consider reduction of right-handed electron-type Majorana neutrinos, in the left–right symmetric model, by the channel and the channel originating from an anomaly, involving the gauge group, as well as decay of such neutrinos. We study the reduction of these neutrinos for different ranges of left–right model parameters, and find that, if the neutrino mass exceeds the right-handed gauge boson mass, then the neutrinos never decouple for realistic values of the parameters, but, rather, decay in equilibrium. Because there is no out-of-equilibrium decay, no mass bounds can be set for the neutrinos. Received: 1 November 2000 / Published online: 23 February 2001     

W pair production by Z0 pair fusion

Using the effective gauge boson approximation we calculate the invariant mass distribution and longitudinal polarization fraction for the production of W⁺W⁻ pairs by Z⁰ pair fusion at a collider energy of 40 TeV. The mass distribution is compared with the case where the production is by W⁺W₋ pair fusion. Results are presented for Higgs masses of 0.5 and 1 TeV.     

Theoretical and experimental update on a model featuring a second Z-boson

An update is provided on theoretical and experimental aspects of a simple extension of the standard model featuring right-handed neutrinos and a second neutral gauge boson (Z′). We identify an ambiguity which a priori exists in the definition of electric charge in this model, and show spontaneous symmetry breaking can resolve it. We then re-analyse the experimental bounds on the mass of Z′ in the light of recent measurements of the standard Z boson mass and width at LEP and SLC. We find that the lower bound at 90% confidence level for the Z′ mass is 460 GeV.     

WW collisions from polarized electron or proton beams,polarized luminosities and applications

A complete formulation of Vector boson-Vector boson processes ine ⁺ e ^?,pp andep collisions is done including Parity violation and beam polarization effects. Single vector boson (W ^±,Z, ψ) distributions inside leptons, quarks and proton as well as luminosity factors and polarization asymmetry factors are established for all (parity conserving and parity violating) helicity combinations. First applications are given for single particle (Higgs,Z′) production, for vector boson-vector boson scattering and for heavy fermion pair production.     

Relatively heavy Higgs boson in more generic gauge mediation

We discuss gauge mediation models where the doublet messengers and Higgs doublets are allowed to mix through a “charged” coupling. The charged coupling replaces messenger parity as a means of suppressing flavor changing neutral currents without introducing any unwanted CP violation. As a result of this mixing between the Higgs doublets and the messengers, relatively large A-terms are generated at the messenger scale. These large A-terms produce a distinct weak scale mass spectrum. Particularly, we show that the lightest Higgs boson mass is enhanced and can be as heavy as 125 GeV for a gluino mass as light as 2 TeV. We also show that the stops are heavier than that predicted by conventional gauge mediation models. It is also shown that these models have a peculiar slepton mass spectrum.     

Aq-deformed left-right symmetric model

A newq-deformed Left-Right Symmetric model is constructed and the various mass relations and mixing angles are derived. It is shown that the model allows for parity violation, and predicts a new Z’ gauge boson.     

Search for W' boson resonances decaying to a top quark and a bottom quark

We search for the production of a heavy W' gauge boson that decays to third generation quarks in 0.9 fb-1 of pp collisions at square root(s)=1.96 TeV, collected with the D0 detector at the Fermilab Tevatron collider. We find no significant excess in the final-state invariant mass distribution and set upper limits on the production cross section times branching fraction. For a left-handed W' boson with SM couplings, we set a lower mass limit of 731 GeV. For right-handed W' bosons, we set lower mass limits of 739 GeV if the W' boson decays to both leptons and quarks and 768 GeV if the W' boson decays only to quarks. We also set limits on the coupling of the W' boson to fermions as a function of its mass.     

Two Higgs bi-doublet left-right model with spontaneous P and CP violation

A left-right symmetric model with two Higgs bi-doublet is shown to be a consistent model for both spontaneous P and CP violation. The flavor changing neutral currents can be suppressed by the mechanism of approximate global U(1) family symmetry. The constraints from neural K meson mass difference Δm _K are calculated and it is demonstrated that a right-handed gauge boson W ₂ contribution in box-diagrams with mass well below 1 TeV is allowed due to a cancelation caused by a light-charged Higgs boson with a mass range of 150–300 GeV. The W ₂ contribution to ε _K can be suppressed from an appropriate choice of additional CP phases appearing in the right-handed Cabbibo-Kobayashi-Maskawa matrix. The model is also found to be fully consistent with B ⁰ mass difference Δm _B and the mixing induced CP violation sin2β _{J/ Ψ}, which is usually difficult for the model with only one Higgs bi-doublet. The new physics beyond the standard model can be directly searched at the colliders LHC and ILC. Supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC) (Grant Nos. 10475105 and 10491306) and the Key Project of Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS)     

Dark forces at the Tevatron

A simple explanation of the W+dijet excess recently reported by the CDF collaboration involves the introduction of a new gauge boson with sizable couplings to quarks, but with no or highly suppressed couplings to leptons. Anomaly-free theories which include such a leptophobic gauge boson must also include additional particle content, which may include a stable and otherwise viable candidate for dark matter. Based on the couplings and mass of the Z^′ required to generate the CDF excess, we predict such a dark matter candidate to possess an elastic scattering cross section with nucleons on the order of σ∼¹⁰−40 cm², providing a natural explanation for the signals reported by the CoGeNT and DAMA/LIBRA collaborations. In this light, CDF may be observing the gauge boson responsible for the force which mediates the interactions between the dark and visible matter of our universe.     

Muon anomaly and dark parity violation

The muon anomalous magnetic moment exhibits a 3.6σ discrepancy between experiment and theory. One explanation requires the existence of a light vector boson, Z_{d} (the dark Z), with mass 10-500?MeV that couples weakly to the electromagnetic current through kinetic mixing. Support for such a solution also comes from astrophysics conjectures regarding the utility of a U(1)_{d} gauge symmetry in the dark matter sector. In that scenario, we show that mass mixing between the Z_{d} and ordinary Z boson introduces a new source of "dark" parity violation, which is potentially observable in atomic and polarized electron scattering experiments. Restrictive bounds on the mixing (m_{Z_{d}}/m_{Z})δ are found from existing atomic parity violation results, δ^{2}<2×10^{-5}. Combined with future planned and proposed polarized electron scattering experiments, a sensitivity of δ^{2}～10^{-6} is expected to be reached, thereby complementing direct searches for the Z_{d} boson.     

Gauge hierarchies and mass bounds

We consider the effects of weak symmetry breaking by radiative corrections in a scheme of gauge hierarchies. We obtain new mass bounds on heavy fermions and show how discovery of a Higgs boson may distinguish between two different approaches to hierarchial spontaneous gauge symmetry breakdown. If there are no intrinsic mass scales below ～10¹⁵ GeV then discovery of a Higgs boson at ～9 GeV implies the existence of heavy fermions.     

Hunting new vector bosons in high precision measurements without polarization

We illustrate a strategy to identify the effect of a possible extra neutral vector boson of several different theoretical origins (extended gauge groups, composite models, models with a strongly interacting Higgs sector), assuming that only precision experiments without polarized e⁺e⁻ beams were available. We show that it might be relatively easy to discover evidence of genuine New Physics (i.e., effects not depending on the value of the top mass, or on the existence of new families...) if a certain set of observables, including the final τ polarization in unpolarized e⁺e⁻ annihilation, were measured. The region of possible confusion between different theoretical models would be, though, sensibly larger than in the case in which e⁺e⁻ polarization were available.     

Low-energy neutral current phenomenology and grand unified theories

We derive necessary and sufficient conditions to be satisfied by any expanded electroweak gauge model in order to reproduce the standard model low-energy neutral current predictions. These conditions imply several constraints on the neutral gauge boson masses and quantum number assignments for the ordinary fermions. Using these conditions, we prove that the popular grand unified theories based on the gauge groups SO(10) and E₆ can only accomodate trivial extensions of the standard model. As a consequences, if any of these grand unified models works at some energy scale, present low-energy neutral current phenomenology implies that the Z-boson must be produced with the expected mass and couplings to the ordinary fermions. Any additional neutral gauge boson (with the possible exception of very heavy ones) could only be produced in hadronic collisions and it would not decay in e⁺e^?.     

Electroweak vacuum stability in classically conformal $$$$ extension of the standard model

We consider the minimal U(1)\(_{B-L}\) extension of the standard model (SM) with the classically conformal invariance, where an anomaly-free U(1)\(_{B-L}\) gauge symmetry is introduced along with three generations of right-handed neutrinos and a U(1)\(_{B-L}\) Higgs field. Because of the classically conformal symmetry, all dimensional parameters are forbidden. The \(B-L\) gauge symmetry is radiatively broken through the Coleman–Weinberg mechanism, generating the mass for the \(U(1)_{B-L}\) gauge boson (\(Z^\prime \) boson) and the right-handed neutrinos. Through a small negative coupling between the SM Higgs doublet and the \(B-L\) Higgs field, the negative mass term for the SM Higgs doublet is generated and the electroweak symmetry is broken. In this model context, we investigate the electroweak vacuum instability problem in the SM. It is well known that in the classically conformal U(1)\(_{B-L}\) extension of the SM, the electroweak vacuum remains unstable in the renormalization group analysis at the one-loop level. In this paper, we extend the analysis to the two-loop level, and perform parameter scans. We identify a parameter region which not only solve the vacuum instability problem, but also satisfy the recent ATLAS and CMS bounds from search for \(Z^\prime \) boson resonance at the LHC Run-2. Considering self-energy corrections to the SM Higgs doublet through the right-handed neutrinos and the \(Z^\prime \) boson, we derive the naturalness bound on the model parameters to realize the electroweak scale without fine-tunings.     

Upper bounds on neutrino masses

Using a recent experimental bound on τ decay into three charged leptons and a weak assumption concerning a general “see-saw” mechanism for neutrino masses, we show that both v_μ and v_τ must be lighter than 65 eV. If the “see-saw” is driven by a right-handed W boson or by a “horizontal” gauge boson, they must be heavier than 50 PeV.     

Neutrino superfluidity

It is shown that Dirac-type neutrinos display BCS superfluidity for any nonzero mass. The Cooper pairs are formed by attractive scalar Higgs boson exchange between left- and right-handed neutrinos; in the standard SU(2) x U(1) theory, right-handed neutrinos do not couple to any other boson. The value of the gap, the critical temperature, and the Pippard coherence length are calculated for arbitrary values of the neutrino mass and chemical potential. Although such a superfluid could conceivably exist, detecting it would be a major challenge.     

Complete two loop bosonic contributions to the muon lifetime in the standard model

The last missing correction to the muon lifetime in the standard model at O(alpha(2)) coming from gauge and Higgs boson loops is presented. The associated contribution to the parameter Deltar in the on-shell scheme ranges from 6x10(-5) to -4x10(-5) for Higgs boson masses from 100 GeV to 1 TeV. This result translates into a shift of the W boson mass which does not exceed +/-1 MeV in the same range and amounts, in particular, to approximately -0.8 MeV for a 115 GeV Higgs boson.