Liquid nitrogen is commonly used in cryogenic applications and is a promising medium for the direct immersion cooling of sensors used for nuclear and particle physics experiments. The scintillation properties of gaseous nitrogen are well-documented, but little is known about the scintillation of liquid nitrogen. If present, scintillation light from interactions of ambient radioactivity could produce backgrounds for rare event searches such as the direct detection of dark matter. Using a coincidence-tagged alpha decay, we demonstrate that liquid nitrogen exhibits measurable, albeit very faint, scintillation. Assuming the same scintillation wavelength spectrum as gaseous nitrogen, we estimate a relative scintillation yield of $Y_{\mathrm{LN}}/Y_{\mathrm{GN}}^{\mathrm{STP}}=0.0142\pm 0.0005(\mathrm{stat})\pm 0.0030(\mathrm{sys})$ with respect to gaseous nitrogen at standard temperature and pressure. Considering the average scintillation yield from alpha decays in gaseous nitrogen, this implies a scintillation yield for alpha decays in liquid nitrogen of $Y_{\mathrm{LN}}=(2.39\pm 0.56)\mathrm{photons}\mathrm{per}\mathrm{MeV}$. To our knowledge this is the first measurement of scintillation in liquid nitrogen.

Calculating the action and the interaction Hamiltonian at higher orders in cosmological perturbation theory is a cumbersome task. We employ the formalism of effective field theory of inflation in the decoupling limit for single-field ultraslow-roll (USR) inflation and obtain a nonperturbative Hamiltonian in terms of the Goldstone field $\pi$. To complete the dictionary, a nonlinear relation between the curvature perturbations and $\pi$ is presented. Using these results, we compute higher-order loop corrections in USR models with a sharp transition to the attractor phase, relevant for primordial black holes formation. It is shown that in the idealized picture in which the transition from the USR phase to SR phase is instantaneous and sharp, the loop corrections on long cosmic microwave background scales increase rapidly with the number of loops $L$ and the setup may go out of perturbative control.

We define two new indecomposable (not fully reducible) $\mathcal{N}=8$, $d=1$ off-shell multiplets and consider the corresponding models of $\mathcal{N}=8$ supersymmetric mechanics with spin variables. Each multiplet is described off shell by a scalar superfield which is a nonlinear deformation of the standard scalar superfield $X$ carrying the $d=1$ multiplet ($\mathbf{1},\mathbf{8},\mathbf{7}$). Deformed systems involve, as invariant subsets, two different off-shell versions of the irreducible multiplet ($\mathbf{8},\mathbf{8},\mathbf{0}$). For both systems we present the manifestly $\mathcal{N}=8$ supersymmetric superfield constraints, as well as the component off- and on-shell invariant actions, which for one version exactly match those given in arXiv:2402.00539. The two models differ off shell, but prove to be equivalent to each other on shell, with the spin variables sitting in the adjoint representation of the maximal $R$-symmetry group $\mathrm{SO}(8)$.

The uncertainty principle constitutes a fundamental pillar of quantum theory, representing one of the most distinctive features that differentiates quantum mechanics from classical physics. In this study, we firstly propose a novel generalized entropic uncertainty relation (EUR) for arbitrary multimeasurement in the many-body systems, and rigorously derive a significantly tighter bound compared to existing formulations. Specifically, we discuss the proposed EUR in the context of a Schwarzschild black hole, where we demonstrate the superior tightness of our derived bound. The study further elucidates the dynamical evolution of multipartite quantum coherence and entanglement in the curved spacetime. A particularly noteworthy finding reveals the exact equivalence between entanglement and $l_1$-norm coherence for arbitrary $N$-partite Greenberger-Horne-Zeilinger-type (GHZ-type) states. Moreover, we find that quantum coherence is significantly diminished and the measurement uncertainty increases to a stable maximum with increasing Hawking temperature. Thus, the findings of this study contribute to a deeper understanding of nonclassicality and quantum resources in black holes.

A variety of robust and effective descriptions have been devised to extract model-independent information about the fundamental properties of black holes from observational data when searching for deviations from general relativity. In this work, we construct explicit transformation maps establishing the equivalence among three relevant parametrizations for different static and spherically symmetric spacetime patches: the Johannsen-Psaltis parametrization, the Rezzolla-Zhidenko parametrization, and the effective metric description. We then select representative static and spherically symmetric black hole geometries to determine the minimal number of parameters required within each scheme to reproduce the associated quasinormal mode spectra with a prescribed degree of accuracy. Our analysis shows that, for the given observables, a finite set of coefficients suffices to attain the desired precision in the three frameworks. Finally, we emphasize how the individual strengths of these effective descriptions can be exploited to probe complementary aspects of black hole physics.

We calculate the action and the interaction Hamiltonians to all orders in perturbation theory in the model of single field inflation with a transient ultra slow-roll phase. Employing the formalism of effective field theory (EFT) of inflation, we obtain a compact nonperturbative expression for the interaction Hamiltonian in terms of the Goldstone field $\pi$ in the decoupling limit. In addition, we also present a nonlinear relation between $\pi$ and the curvature perturbations to all orders in perturbation theory. These are powerful results which enable us to calculate the cosmological correlators and loop corrections to any order in perturbation theory. As a nontrivial example, we calculate the $L$-loop corrections on long cosmic microwave background (CMB) scale perturbations in the ultraslow roll (USR) models which are used for primordial black holes (PBHs) formation. We show that the loop corrections scale like $(\mathrm{\Delta }N{\mathcal{P}}_{e}L{)}^L$ in which ${\mathcal{P}}_e$ is the peak of the power spectrum and $\mathrm{\Delta }N$ is the duration of the USR phase. This indicates that the loop corrections grow quickly out of perturbative control for large values of $L$. In the conventional USR setup for PBHs formation with $\mathrm{\Delta }N\simeq 2.5$, this happens at $L=4$.

We present constraints on quintessence dark energy models using the observational detection of the integrated Sachs-Wolfe (ISW)–thermal Sunyaev-Zeldovich (tSZ) cross-correlation dataset. Our analysis compares three classes of quintessence dynamics: thawing, tracker, and scaling-freezing with the standard $\mathrm{\Lambda }$ cold dark matter ($\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{CDM}$) cosmology. Through a comprehensive likelihood analysis, we derive best-fit values and 68% confidence intervals for key cosmological parameters, finding ${\mathrm{\Omega }}_{\mathrm{m}}=0.322_{-0.030}^{+0.027}$ and ${\sigma }_8=0.735_{-0.035}^{+0.045}$ for $\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{CDM}$, with deviations in alternative models consistent within $1\sigma$. For the thawing model, we consider an exponential potential with slope $\lambda =0.736_{-0.227}^{+0.270}$, while for the tracker and scaling-freezing models, we use inverse axionlike and double exponential potentials, respectively. Observationally, the tracker model yields $n=5.651_{-1.604}^{+1.625}$ and $f=0.258_{-0.096}^{+0.149}$, and the scaling-freezing model gives ${\lambda }_1=0.405_{-0.322}^{+0.293}$ and ${\lambda }_2=23.226_{-7.258}^{+7.975}$. The dimensionless tSZ amplitude (${\tilde{W}}^{\mathrm{SZ}}$) and cosmic infrared background (CIB) parameters are tightly constrained across all models, providing additional insights into astrophysical foregrounds. Our results demonstrate the effectiveness of ISW-tSZ cross-correlations as a probe of dark energy dynamics, with the thawing quintessence model yielding the lowest ${\chi }_{\min }^2$ among the tested scenarios, and highlight the need for future high-precision measurements to distinguish between quintessence models and $\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{CDM}$.

In previous work, we developed a method for computing two-point correlators by decomposing the mode degrees of freedom into fast and slow components. Building on this framework, we present a numerical implementation to study the evolution of primordial scalar perturbations under controlled state deformations induced by the simplest environment corrections from the Lindblad equation. The primary contribution of this work is the development of a numerically stable and flexible framework for implementing open-system effects in inflationary perturbations, rather than the extraction of concrete predictions for the primordial spectrum. Our approach generalizes to an arbitrary number of degrees of freedom and does not rely on the slow-roll approximation. The computational routine is numerically efficient and allows users to configure arbitrary sequences of decoherence events, with full control over their duration, shape, amplitude, and effective wavelength range. The resulting outputs are compatible with nonlinear numerical codes, enabling studies of how decoherence effects propagate during reheating.

Galaxy surveys are crucial for studying large-scale structure (LSS) and cosmology, yet they face limitations—imaging surveys provide extensive sky coverage but suffer from photo-$z$ uncertainties, while spectroscopic surveys yield precise redshifts but are sample limited. To take advantage of both photo-$z$ and spec-$z$ data while eliminating photo-$z$ errors, we propose a deep learning framework based on a dual UNet architecture that integrates these two datasets at the field level to reconstruct the three-dimensional photo-$z$ density field. We train the network on mock samples representative of stage-IV spectroscopic surveys, utilizing CosmicGrowth simulations with a $z=0.59$ snapshot containing ${2048}^3$ particles in a $(1200h^{-1}\mathrm{Mpc}{)}^3$ volume. Several metrics, including correlation coefficient, mean absolute error, mean squared error, peak SNR, and structural similarity index measure, validate the model’s accuracy. Moreover, the reconstructed power spectrum closely matches the ground truth at small scales ($k\gtrsim 0.06h/\mathrm{Mpc}$) within the $1\sigma$ confidence level, while the UNet model significantly improves the estimation of photo-$z$ power spectrum multipoles. This study demonstrates the potential of deep learning to enhance LSS reconstruction by using both spectroscopic and photometric data.

Ultralight scalar fields may explain the nature of the dark matter in our Universe. If such scalars couple quadratically to particles of the Standard Model the scalar acquires an effective mass that depends on the local matter energy density. The changing mass causes the field to deviate from its cosmological value in experimental environments. In this work we show that the presence of a local overdensity enclosing the experiment, for example a cavity, vacuum chamber, or satellite can strongly suppress the value of the scalar and its gradient in the interior. This makes detection of such scalar dark matter challenging, and significantly relaxes constraints on strongly coupled models. We also discuss the possibility that quadratically coupled ultralight scalar dark matter could be detected by the differential measurement of the force on two cavities of the same mass but different internal structure.

We present a comprehensive reevaluation of pulsar radio spectra using the largest curated dataset of calibrated flux densities to date, comprising 897 pulsars, and employing a robust Bayesian framework for model comparison alongside frequentist methods. Contrary to the established consensus that pulsar spectra are predominantly simple power laws, our analysis reveals that complex spectral shapes with curvature or breaks are in fact the norm. The broken power law emerges as the most common spectral shape, accounting for 60% of pulsars, while the simple power law describes only 13.5%, with 68.8% of pulsars decisively favoring curved or broken models. We further identify 74 confident gigahertz-peaked spectrum pulsars and demonstrate that millisecond pulsars frequently exhibit spectral curvature. A key finding is that the previously reported dominance of the simple power law was largely a statistical artifact of the frequentist method used in earlier work. These findings substantially revise the prevailing view of pulsar spectra and establish a critical, model-classified foundation for future theoretical work.

Dark-matter-dominated dwarf galaxies provide an excellent laboratory for testing dark matter models at small scale and, in particular, the ultralight dark matter (ULDM) class of models. Within the framework of self-interacting bosonic dark matter, we use the observed velocity-dispersion profiles of seven dwarf spheroidal galaxies to constrain the parameters of ULDM. In our modeling, we account for the impact of the baryonic component on the velocity dispersion and ULDM halo structure. We find that the repulsive self-interaction of ULDM, which fits the observations, is almost negligible, consistent with noninteracting ULDM with a boson mass of approximately $1.6\times {10}^{-22}\mathrm{eV}$. In contrast, for attractively interacting ULDM, the best fit corresponds to a smaller boson mass of about $1.3\times {10}^{-22}\mathrm{eV}$, with self-interaction playing a significant role in shaping the dark-matter halo and thereby influencing the interpretation of observations.

A Galactic core-collapse supernova (CCSN) is likely to be observed in neutrino detectors around the world minutes to hours before the electromagnetic radiation arrives. The SuperNova Early Warning System (SNEWS2.0) network of neutrino and dark matter detectors aims to use the relative arrival times of the neutrinos at the different experiments to point back to the supernova so as to facilitate follow-up observation. One of the simplest methods to estimate the CCSN direction is to use the first neutrino events detected through the inverse $\beta$ decay (IBD) process, ${\overline{\nu }}_{e}p\to e^{+}n$. We will consider neutrino detectors sensitive to IBD interactions with low backgrounds. The difference in signal arrival times between a large and a small detector will be biased, however, with the first event at the smaller detector, on average, arriving later than that at the larger detector. This bias can be mitigated by using these first events in a data-driven approach without recourse to simulations or models. The resulting method requires, at minimum, only the times of the first events at most detectors, along with a longer time series of events from one larger detector to act as a reference lightcurve. In this article, we demonstrate this method and its uncertainty estimate using pairs of detectors of different sizes and with different supernova distances. Finally, we use this method to calculate probability skymaps using four detectors currently in operation, Super-Kamiokande, Jiangmen Underground Neutrino Observatory (JUNO), Large Volume Detector (LVD), and $\mathrm{SNO}+$, and show that the calculated probabilities yield appropriate confidence intervals for all supernova directions. The area of the 68% confidence interval varies by distance and direction, but is expected to be a few thousand square degrees. The resulting skymaps should be useful for the multimessenger community as a rapid, initial pointing to follow up on the SNEWS2.0 Galactic CCSN neutrino alert.

Effective field theories are the primary tool for interpreting precision collider data in the absence of new resonances. However, in the dimension-8 Standard Model effective field theory, the utility of traditional algebraically minimal bases is fundamentally limited by kinematic mixing: multiple operators contribute to a single high-energy amplitude, creating degeneracies that obscure ultraviolet interpretations and complicate the application of theoretical constraints. We introduce a generative framework that resolves this by constructing operators directly from the conserved Noether currents of the Standard Model. The resulting kinematically diagonalized current basis (KDCB) ensures that each operator maps to a unique asymptotic energy scaling ($E^4$, $E^2$, $E^0$) in scattering amplitudes. This organization makes S-matrix positivity bounds manifest, enables a stable auxiliary-field formulation for Monte Carlo simulation, and provides direct diagnostics for universal versus nonuniversal ultraviolet completions through current decomposition. By rotating the operator space into physically interpretable sectors, the KDCB offers a transformative framework for global fits and a clear pathway from high-energy data to the structure of new physics.

Gravitational wave interferometers have studied compact object mergers and solidified our understanding of strong gravity. Their increasing precision raises the possibility of detecting new physics, especially in a neutron star binary system that may contain hidden-sector particles. In particular, a new vector force between binary constituents, giving rise to dark electromagnetic phenomena, could measurably alter the inspiral waveforms and thus be constrained by gravitational wave observations. In this work, we critically examine the mechanisms for neutron stars to acquire enough hidden-sector particles with requisite couplings to furnish a detectable signature from dark electromagnetism. In particular, we explore three plausible mechanisms for achieving a sufficient dark mass fraction, and we derive quite general limitations on the amount of charge that can be accumulated by any of these mechanisms. We demonstrate that the repulsive nature of vector forces imposes stringent constraints on any putative particle physics model or astrophysical environment which could give rise to such gravitational signatures. We argue that absent an extreme fine-tuning of parameters, such signatures are well out of reach of any current or near-future gravitational wave observatory.

Vector leptoquarks (vLQs) are popular candidates for searching for physics beyond the Standard Model (SM). In this paper, we present updated exclusion limits on various vLQ species, accounting for all the relevant production mechanisms at the LHC. In particular, we highlight the critical role of indirect production and its interference with the SM Drell-Yan process. This interference can be constructive or destructive, depending on the specific quantum numbers of the vLQ, and significantly impacts the sensitivity of current searches. Furthermore, we demonstrate that including $\mathrm{QCD}+\mathrm{QED}$ mixed pair production channels leads to a noticeable shift in model-independent mass limits. Additionally, we examine the validity of the full theory with vLQs and corresponding effective operators in the high mass regime. Overall, our analysis yields a substantial improvement in the exclusion limits on vLQs compared to the existing results in the literature.

We introduce a new mechanism for the simultaneous generation of baryon and dark matter asymmetries through ultraviolet-dominated freeze-in scatterings. The mechanism relies on heavy Majorana neutrinos that connect the visible Standard Model sector to a dark sector through the neutrino portal. Following reheating of the visible sector to a temperature well below the heavy neutrino masses, we show that 2-to-2 scattering processes can populate the dark sector and generate both baryon and dark matter asymmetries. In some parameter regions, the dominant source of baryon asymmetry can be charge transfer from the dark sector, a process we call dark wash-in. We also demonstrate that annihilation of the dark matter to massless states within the dark sector can deplete the symmetric population without destroying the net baryon charge to leave only an asymmetric dark matter abundance today. Depending on the specific model parameters, the observed baryon and dark matter abundances can be attained with heavy neutrino masses $M_N\gtrsim {10}^{10}\mathrm{GeV}$ and dark matter masses in the range $0.1\mathrm{GeV}\lesssim m_{\chi }\lesssim {10}^3\mathrm{GeV}$ if the dark matter relic abundance is mainly asymmetric and even lower masses if it is symmetric.

The $Z^0$ bosons produced in electron-positron collisions at the potential Future Circular Collider (FCC-ee) provide unique opportunities for flavor physics. The nonzero polarization of ${\mathrm{\Lambda }}_b^0$ baryons produced in $Z^0$ decays enables access to a much larger set of observables than at the LHC, where the ${\mathrm{\Lambda }}_b^0$ baryons are produced unpolarized. This paper presents a toy angular analysis of ${\mathrm{\Lambda }}_b^0\to \mathrm{\Lambda }(\to p{\pi }^{-}){\mu }^{+}{\mu }^{-}$ decays using simulation samples of collisions at the FCC-ee reconstructed using the IDEA detector concept and assuming a dataset of $6\times {10}^{12}$ $Z^0$ bosons. While the statistical sensitivity achieved for individual angular observables is not expected to significantly exceed that from the LHCb Upgrade II experiment, the addition of the polarized observables leads to a significant improvement of the knowledge on the Wilson coefficients $C_{9^{(\prime )}}$ and $C_{{10}^{(\prime )}}$.

The gradient-flow scale $w_0$ in lattice QCD is determined using the mass of the ${\mathrm{\Omega }}^{-}$ baryon to set the physical scale. Nine ensembles using the highly improved staggered quark (HISQ) action with lattice spacings of 0.15 fm down to 0.04 fm are used, seven of which have nearly physical light-quark masses. Electromagnetic corrections to the ${\mathrm{\Omega }}^{-}$ mass are defined in order to compute a pure-QCD $\mathrm{\Omega }$ mass. The final result is $w_0=0.17187(68)\mathrm{fm}$, corresponding to a relative uncertainty of 0.40% and a central value in good agreement with previous calculations in the literature.

Employing the Polyakov chiral SU(3) mean field (PCQMF) model, we investigate how momentum-space anisotropy, characteristic of quark-gluon plasma (QGP) in ultrarelativistic heavy-ion collisions (uRHIC), impacts the thermodynamic behavior and transport coefficients of strongly interacting quark matter. The momentum anisotropy is introduced via a small deformation in the momentum distribution, quantified by a spheroidal parameter $\xi$, which deforms the distribution functions and captures anisotropic effects to linear order. The PCQMF model captures key non-perturbative aspects of QCD, such as chiral symmetry breaking or deconfinement dynamics through Polyakov loop potential, and is extended here to accommodate momentum-space anisotropy. We compute the modifications induced by momentum-space anisotropy to key thermodynamic observables including pressure $p$, energy density $\epsilon$, entropy density $s$, speed of sound squared $c_s^2$, and specific heat $c_v$, alongside key transport coefficients such as shear viscosity $\eta$, bulk viscosity ${\zeta }_b$, and electrical conductivity ${\sigma }_{\mathrm{el}}$. These coefficients are derived using the relativistic Boltzmann equation (RBE) under the relaxation time approximation (RTA). We find that even a weak anisotropy can lead to significant modifications in the thermodynamic response and transport behavior of quark matter. This underscores the importance of including momentum anisotropy for realistic modeling of the QCD medium across all energy regimes, from current studies at RHIC and LHC to future explorations of the high-density frontier at FAIR, NICA, and J-PARC.