We present measurements of weak gravitational lensing cosmic shear two-point statistics using Dark Energy Survey Science Verification data. We demonstrate that our results are robust to the choice of shear measurement pipeline, either ngmix or im3shape, and robust to the choice of two-point statistic, including both real and Fourier-space statistics. Our results pass a suite of null tests including tests for B-mode contamination and direct tests for any dependence of the two-point functions on a set of 16 observing conditions and galaxy properties, such as seeing, airmass, galaxy color, galaxy magnitude, etc. We furthermore use a large suite of simulations to compute the covariance matrix of the cosmic shear measurements and assign statistical significance to our null tests. We find that our covariance matrix is consistent with the halo model prediction, indicating that it has the appropriate level of halo sample variance. We compare the same jackknife procedure applied to the data and the simulations in order to search for additional sources of noise not captured by the simulations. We find no statistically significant extra sources of noise in the data. The overall detection significance with tomography for our highest source density catalog is $9.7\sigma$. Cosmological constraints from the measurements in this work are presented in a companion paper [DES et al., Phys. Rev. D 94, 022001 (2016).].

We present the first constraints on cosmology from the Dark Energy Survey (DES), using weak lensing measurements from the preliminary Science Verification (SV) data. We use 139 square degrees of SV data, which is less than 3% of the full DES survey area. Using cosmic shear 2-point measurements over three redshift bins we find ${\sigma }_8({\mathrm{\Omega }}_{\mathrm{m}}/0.3{)}^{0.5}=0.81\pm 0.06$ (68% confidence), after marginalizing over 7 systematics parameters and 3 other cosmological parameters. We examine the robustness of our results to the choice of data vector and systematics assumed, and find them to be stable. About 20% of our error bar comes from marginalizing over shear and photometric redshift calibration uncertainties. The current state-of-the-art cosmic shear measurements from CFHTLenS are mildly discrepant with the cosmological constraints from Planck CMB data; our results are consistent with both data sets. Our uncertainties are $\sim 30\%$ larger than those from CFHTLenS when we carry out a comparable analysis of the two data sets, which we attribute largely to the lower number density of our shear catalogue. We investigate constraints on dark energy and find that, with this small fraction of the full survey, the DES SV constraints make negligible impact on the Planck constraints. The moderate disagreement between the CFHTLenS and Planck values of ${\sigma }_8({\mathrm{\Omega }}_{\mathrm{m}}/0.3{)}^{0.5}$ is present regardless of the value of $w$.

This paper includes two main parts. In the first part, we present generalized gauge models based on the $SU(3{)}_C\otimes SU(4{)}_L\otimes U(1{)}_X$ (3-4-1) gauge group with arbitrary electric charges of exotic leptons. The mixing matrix of neutral gauge bosons is analyzed, and the eigenmasses and eigenstates are obtained. The anomaly-free as well as matching conditions are discussed precisely. In the second part, we present a new development of the original 3-4-1 model [R. Foot, H. N. Long, and T. A. Tran, Phys. Rev. D 50, R34 (1994), F. Pisano and V. Pleitez, Phys. Rev. D 51, 3865 (1995).]. Different from previous works, in this paper the neutrinos, with the help of the scalar decuplet $H$, get the Dirac masses at the tree level. The vacuum expectation value (VEV) of the Higgs boson field in the decuplet $H$ acquiring the VEV responsible for neutrino Dirac mass leads to mixing in separated pairs of singly charged gauge bosons, namely the Standard Model (SM) $W$ boson and $K$, the new gauge boson acting in the right-handed lepton sector, as well as the singly charged bileptons $X$ and $Y$. Due to the mixing, there occurs a right-handed current carried by the $W$ boson. From the expression of the electromagnetic coupling constant, ones get the limit of the sine-squared of the Weinberg angle, ${\sin }^2{\theta }_W<0.25$, and a constraint on electric charges of extra leptons. In the limit of lepton number conservation, the Higgs sector contains all massless Goldstone bosons for massive gauge bosons and the SM-like Higgs boson. Some phenomenology is discussed.

We propose that the diphoton excess at 750 GeV reported by ATLAS and CMS is due to the decay of an exo-Higgs scalar $\eta$ associated with the breaking of a new $SU(2{)}_e$ symmetry, dubbed exo-spin. New fermions, exo-quarks and exo-leptons, get TeV-scale masses through Yukawa couplings with $\eta$ and generate its couplings to gluons and photons at one loop. The matter content of our model yields a $B-L$ anomaly under $SU(2{)}_e$, whose breaking we assume entails a first-order phase transition. A nontrivial $B-L$ asymmetry may therefore be generated in the early Universe, potentially providing a baryogenesis mechanism through the Standard Model (SM) sphaleron processes. The spontaneous breaking of $SU(2{)}_e$ can, in principle, directly lead to electroweak symmetry breaking, thereby accounting for the proximity of the mass scales of the SM Higgs and the exo-Higgs. Our model can be distinguished from those comprising a singlet scalar and vector fermions by the discovery of TeV scale exo-vector bosons, corresponding to the broken $SU(2{)}_e$ generators, at the LHC.

We show that quarkonialike states of a hidden $\mathrm{SU}(N)$ gauge group can account for the 750 GeV diphoton excess observed by ATLAS and CMS, even with constituents carrying standard model hypercharge only. The required hypercharge is modest, varying between about 1.3–1.6 for strong $\mathrm{SU}(N)$ coupling to 2–3 for weak $\mathrm{SU}(N)$ coupling, for $N=3$, 4. This scenario predicts a variety of diphoton and multiphoton resonances, as well as photons from continuum pair production, and possibly exotic decays into standard model fermions, with no significant multijet resonances.

We construct a hadron-quark two-phase model based on the Walecka-quantum hadrodynamics and the improved Polyakov–Nambu–Jona-Lasinio (PNJL) model with an explicit chemical potential dependence of Polyakov loop potential ($\mu$PNJL model). With respect to the original PNJL model, the confined-deconfined phase transition is largely affected at low temperature and large chemical potential. Using the two-phase model, we investigate the equilibrium transition between hadronic and quark matter at finite chemical potentials and temperatures. The numerical results show that the transition boundaries from nuclear to quark matter move towards smaller chemical potential (lower density) when the $\mu$-dependent Polyakov loop potential is taken. In particular, for charge asymmetric matter, we compute the local asymmetry of $u$, $d$ quarks in the hadron-quark coexisting phase, and analyze the isospin-relevant observables possibly measurable in heavy-ion collision (HIC) experiments. In general new HIC data on the location and properties of the mixed phase would bring relevant information on the expected chemical potential dependence of the Polyakov loop contribution.

We consider a new form of analytical perturbation theory expansion in the massless $SU(N_c)$ theory, for the nonsinglet part of the $e^{+}{e}^{-}$-annihilation to hadrons Adler function $D^{ns}$ and of the Bjorken sum rule of the polarized lepton-hadron deep-inelastic scattering $C_{ns}^{Bjp}$, and demonstrate its validity at the $O({\alpha }_s^4)$-level at least. It is a two-fold series in powers of the conformal anomaly and of $SU(N_c)$ coupling ${\alpha }_s$. Explicit expressions are obtained for the $\{\beta \}$-expanded perturbation coefficients at $O({\alpha }_s^4)$ level in $\overline{\mathrm{MS}}$ scheme, for both considered physical quantities. Comparisons of the terms in the $\{\beta \}$-expanded coefficients are made with the corresponding terms obtained by using extra gluino degrees of freedom, or skeleton-motivated expansion, or $R_{\delta }$-scheme motivated expansion in the Principle of Maximal Conformality. Relations between terms of the $\{\beta \}$-expansion for the $D^{ns}$- and $C_{ns}^{Bjp}$-functions, which follow from the conformal symmetry limit and its violation, are presented. The relevance to the possible new analyses of the experimental data for the Adler function and Bjorken sum rule is discussed.

The occupied Landau levels of strange quark matter are investigated in the framework of the SU(3) NJL model with a conventional coupling and a magnetic-field dependent coupling respectively. At lower density, the Landau levels are mainly dominated by $u$ and $d$ quarks. Threshold values of the chemical potential for the $s$ quark onset are shown in the $\mu \text{−}B$ plane. The magnetic-field-dependent running coupling can broaden the region of three-flavor matter by decreasing the dynamical masses of $s$ quarks. Before the onset of $s$ quarks, the Landau level number of light quarks is directly dependent on the magnetic field strength $B$ by a simple inverse proportional relation $k_{i,\max }\approx B_i^0/B$ with $B_d^0=5\times 10^{19}\mathrm{G}$, which is approximately 2 times $B_u^0$ of $u$ quarks at a common chemical potential. When the magnetic field increases up to $B_d^0$, almost all three flavors are lying in the lowest Landau level.

Vacuum birefringence is one of the most striking predictions of strong field quantum electrodynamics: Probe photons traversing a strong field region can indirectly sense the applied “pump” electromagnetic field via quantum fluctuations of virtual charged particles which couple to both pump and probe fields. This coupling is sensitive to the field alignment and can effectively result in two different indices of refraction for the probe photon polarization modes giving rise to a birefringence phenomenon. In this article, we perform a dedicated theoretical analysis of the proposed discovery experiment of vacuum birefringence at an x-ray free electron laser/optical high-intensity laser facility. Describing both pump and probe laser pulses realistically in terms of their macroscopic electromagnetic fields, we go beyond previous analyses by accounting for various effects not considered before in this context. Our study facilitates stringent quantitative predictions and optimizations of the signal in an actual experiment.

The lifetime of the $B_s^0$ meson is measured in the decay channel $B_s^0\to J/\psi {\pi }^{+}{\pi }^{-}$ with $880\le M_{{\pi }^{+}{\pi }^{-}}\le 1080\mathrm{MeV}/c^2$, which is mainly a $CP$-odd state and dominated by the $f_0(980)$ resonance. In $10.4{\mathrm{fb}}^{-1}$ of data collected with the D0 detector in Run II of the Tevatron, the lifetime of the $B_s^0$ meson is measured to be $\tau (B_s^0)=1.70\pm 0.14(\mathrm{stat})\pm 0.05(\text{syst})\mathrm{ps}$. Neglecting $CP$ violation in $B_s^0/{\overline{B}}_s^0$ mixing, the measurement can be translated into the width of the heavy mass eigenstate of the $B_s^0$, ${\mathrm{\Gamma }}_H=0.59\pm 0.05(\mathrm{stat})\pm 0.02(\mathrm{syst}){\mathrm{ps}}^{-1}$.

We complete the reformulation of the holographic correspondence as a highly efficient renormalization group (RG) flow that can also determine the UV data in the field theory in the strong-coupling and large-$N$ limit. We introduce a special way to define operators at any given scale in terms of appropriate coarse-grained collective variables, without requiring the use of the elementary fields. The Wilsonian construction is generalized by promoting the cutoff to a functional of these collective variables. We impose three criteria to determine the coarse-graining. The first criterion is that the effective Ward identities for local conservation of energy, momentum, etc. should preserve their standard forms, but in new scale-dependent background metric and sources which are functionals of the effective single-trace operators. The second criterion is that the scale-evolution equations of the operators in the actual background metric should be state-independent, implying that the collective variables should not explicitly appear in them. The final required criterion is that the end point of the scale-evolution of the RG flow can be transformed to a fixed point corresponding to familiar nonrelativistic equations with a finite number of parameters, such as incompressible nonrelativistic Navier-Stokes, under a certain universal rescaling of the scale and of the time coordinate. Using previous work, we explicitly show that in the hydrodynamic limit each such highly efficient RG flow reproduces a unique classical gravity theory with precise UV data that satisfy our IR criterion and also lead to regular horizons in the dual geometries. We obtain the explicit coarse-graining which reproduces Einstein’s equations. In a simple example, we are also able to construct a low-energy effective action and compute the beta function. Finally, we show how our construction can be interpolated with the traditional Wilsonian RG flow at a suitable scale and can be used to develop new nonperturbative frameworks for QCD-like theories.

We investigate how the holographic correspondence can be reformulated as a generalization of Wilsonian renormalization group (RG) flow in a strongly interacting large-$N$ quantum field theory. We first define a highly efficient RG flow as one in which the Ward identities related to local conservation of energy, momentum and charges preserve the same form at each scale. To achieve this, it is necessary to redefine the background metric and external sources at each scale as functionals of the effective single-trace operators. These redefinitions also absorb the contributions of the multitrace operators to these effective Ward identities. Thus, the background metric and external sources become effectively dynamical, reproducing the dual classical gravity equations in one higher dimension. Here, we focus on reconstructing the pure gravity sector as a highly efficient RG flow of the energy-momentum tensor operator, leaving the explicit constructive field theory approach for generating such RG flows to the second part of the work. We show that special symmetries of the highly efficient RG flows carry information through which we can decode the gauge fixing of bulk diffeomorphisms in the corresponding gravity equations. We also show that the highly efficient RG flow which reproduces a given classical gravity theory in a given gauge is unique provided the endpoint can be transformed to a nonrelativistic fixed point with a finite number of parameters under a universal rescaling. The results obtained here are used in the second part of this work, where we do an explicit field-theoretic construction of the RG flow and obtain the dual classical gravity theory.

A very simple, quadratic potential is used to construct vortex strings in a generalized Skyrme model and an additional quadratic potential is used to embed sine-Gordon-type halfkinks onto the string worldline, yielding half-Skyrmions on a string. The strings are furthermore compactified onto a circle and the halfkinks are forced to appear in pairs; in particular $2B$ halfkinks (half-Skyrmions) will appear as beads on a ring with $B$ being the number of times the host vortex is twisted and also the baryon number (Skyrmion number) from the bulk point of view. Finally, we construct an effective field theory on the torus, describing the kinks living on the vortex rings.

We have argued previously, based on the analysis of two-dimensional stringy black holes, that information in stringy versions of four-dimensional Schwarzschild black holes (the singular regions of which are represented by appropriate Wess-Zumino-Witten models) is retained by quantum $W$ symmetries when the horizon area is not preserved due to Hawking radiation. It is key that the exactly marginal conformal world-sheet operator representing a massless stringy particle interacting with the black hole requires a contribution from $W_{\infty }$ generators in its vertex function. The latter correspond to delocalized, nonpropagating, string excitations that guarantee the transfer of information between the string black hole and external particles. When infalling matter crosses the horizon, these topological states are excited via a process: (stringy black hole) $+$ infalling matter $\to$ (stringy black hole)${}^{\star }$, where the black hole is viewed as a stringy state with a specific configuration of $W_{\infty }$ charges that are conserved. Hawking radiation is then the reverse process, with conservation of the $W_{\infty }$ charges retaining information. The Hawking radiation spectrum near the horizon of a Schwarzschild or Kerr black hole is specified by matrix elements of higher-order currents that form a phase-space $W_{1+\infty }$ algebra. We show that an appropriate gauging of this algebra preserves the horizon two-dimensional area classically, as expected because the latter is a conserved Noether charge.

Vacuum excitation by time-varying boundary conditions is not only of fundamental importance but also has recently been confirmed in a laboratory experiment. In this paper, we study the vacuum excitation of a scalar field by the instantaneous appearance and disappearance of a two-sided Dirichlet wall in the middle of a one-dimensional cavity, as toy models of bifurcating and merging spacetimes, respectively. It is shown that the energy flux emitted positively diverges on the null lines emanating from the appearance and disappearance events, which is analogous to the result of Anderson and DeWitt. This result suggests that the semiclassical effect prevents the spacetime both from bifurcating and merging. In addition, we argue that the diverging flux in the disappearance case plays an interesting role to compensate for the low ambient energy density after the disappearance, which is lower than the zero-point level.

The thermalization process of an out-of-equilibrium boost-invariant strongly interacting non-Abelian plasma is investigated using a holographic method. Boundary sourcing, a distortion of the boundary metric, is employed to drive the system far from equilibrium. Thermalization is analyzed in the fully dynamical system through nonlocal probes: the equal-time two-point correlation function of large conformal dimension operators in the boundary theory, and Wilson loops of different shapes. A dependence of the thermalization time on the size of the probes is found, which can be compared to the result of local observables: the onset of thermalization is first observed at short distances.

We reexamine the emergence of a universal nonequilibrium steady state following a local quench between quantum critical heat baths in spatial dimensions greater than one. We show that energy transport proceeds by the formation of an instantaneous shock wave and a broadening rarefaction wave on either side of the interface, and not by two shock waves as previously proposed. For small temperature differences the universal steady state energy currents of the two-shock and rarefaction-shock solutions coincide. Over a broad range of parameters, the difference in the energy flow across the interface between these two solutions is at the level of 2%. The properties of the energy flow remain fully universal and independent of the microscopic theory. We briefly discuss the width of the shock wave in a viscous fluid, the effects of momentum relaxation, and the generalization to charged fluids.

We construct exact solutions of BPS pion domain walls in the four-dimensional $\mathcal{N}=1$ supersymmetric $SU(N)$ chiral Lagrangian with pion masses introduced via linear and quadratic superpotentials. The model admits $N$ discrete vacua in the center of $SU(N)$ for the linear superpotential. In addition to the latter, new vacua appear for the quadratic superpotential. We find that the domain wall solutions of pions (Nambu-Goldstone bosons) that interpolate between a pair of (pion) vacua preserve half of supersymmetry. Contrary to our expectations, we have not been able to find domain walls involving the quasi-Nambu-Goldstone bosons present in the theory, which in turn has the consequence that not all vacua of the theory are connected by a BPS domain wall solution.

We study the diphoton excesses near 750 GeV recently reported by the ATLAS and CMS collaborations within the context of a phenomenologically interesting intersecting/magnetized D-brane model on a toroidal orientifold. It is shown that the model contains a Standard Model singlet scalar as well as vector-like quarks and leptons. In addition, it is shown that the singlet scalar has Yukawa couplings with vector-like quarks and leptons such that it may be produced in proton-proton collisions via gluon fusion as well as decay to diphotons through loops involving the vector-like quarks. Moreover, the required vector-like quarks and leptons may appear in complete $SU(5)$ multiplets so that gauge coupling unification may be maintained. Finally, it is shown that the diphoton signal may be accommodated within the model.

The first discovery of the gravitational-wave (GW) event, GW150914, suggests a higher merger rate of black-hole (BH) binaries. If this is true, a number of BH binaries will be observed via the second-generation GW detectors, and the statistical properties of the observed BH binaries can be scrutinized. A naive but important question to ask is whether the spatial distribution of BH binaries faithfully traces the matter inhomogeneities in the Universe or not. Although the BH binaries are thought to be formed inside the galaxies in most of the scenarios, there is no observational evidence to confirm such a hypothesis. Here, we estimate how well the second-generation GW detectors can statistically confirm the BH binaries to be a tracer of the large-scale structure by looking at the auto- and cross-correlation of BH binaries with photometric galaxies and weak-lensing measurements, finding that, with a 3 year observation, the $>3\sigma$ detection of a nonzero signal is possible if the BH merger rate today is ${\dot{n}}_0\gtrsim 100{\mathrm{Gpc}}^{-3}{\mathrm{yr}}^{-1}$ and the clustering bias of BH binaries is $b_{\mathrm{BH},0}\gtrsim 1.5$.