We present a unified description of gravitational-wave data analysis that unites the template-based analysis used to detect deterministic signals from well-modeled sources, such as binary-black-hole mergers, with the cross-correlation analysis used to detect stochastic gravitational-wave backgrounds. We also discuss the connection between template-based analyses and those that target poorly-modeled bursts of gravitational waves, and suggest a new approach for detecting burst signals.

Heavy fields coupled to the inflaton reduce the speed of sound in the effective theory of the adiabatic mode each time the background inflationary trajectory deviates from a geodesic. This can result in features in the primordial spectra. We compute the corresponding bispectrum and show that if a varying speed of sound induces features in the power spectrum, the change in the bispectrum is given by a simple formula involving the change in the power spectrum and its derivatives. In this manner, we provide a uniquely discriminable signature of a varying sound speed for the adiabatic mode during inflation that indicates the influence of heavy fields. We find that features in the bispectrum peak in the equilateral limit and, in particular, in the squeezed limit we find considerable enhancement entirely consistent with the single field consistency relation. From the perspective of the underlying effective theory, our results generalize to a wide variety of inflationary models where features are sourced by the time variation of background quantities. A positive detection of such correlated features would be unambiguous proof of the inflaton’s nature as a single light scalar degree of freedom embedded in a theory that is UV completable.

In his Comment, D. Bugg argues against our usage of the Particle Data Group collection of light nonstrange states together with the half-width rule to analyze the linearity of radial and angular-moment Regge trajectories in the large-$N_c$ limit. After taking into account his observations on our choice of data, the radial Regge trajectories are again analyzed. We still find that our conclusion on the lack of universality between radial- and angular-momentum Regge trajectories is valid.

Masjuan, Arriola, and Broniowski [Phys. Rev. D 85, 094006 (2012)] claim that the slope of the light-quark radial trajectories is $1.35\pm 0.04{\mathrm{GeV}}^2$, disagreeing with the Crystal Barrel value $1.143\pm 0.013{\mathrm{GeV}}^2$. There are defects in their choice of data. When these defects are revised, results come back close to the Crystal Barrel average for the slope. A revised average value is given here.

We show that the $SU(3{)}_C\otimes SU(3{)}_L\otimes U(1{)}_X$ (3-3-1) model of strong and electroweak interactions can naturally accommodate an extra $U(1{)}_N$ symmetry behaving as a gauge symmetry. The resulting theory based on $SU(3{)}_C\otimes SU(3{)}_L\otimes U(1{)}_X\otimes U(1{)}_N$ (3-3-1-1) gauge symmetry realizes $B-L=-(2/\sqrt{3})T_8+N$ as a charge of $SU(3{)}_L\otimes U(1{)}_N$. Consequently, a residual symmetry, $W$ parity, resulting from broken $B-L$, similarly to $R$-parity in supersymmetry, is always conserved and may be unbroken. There is a specific fermion content recently studied in which all new particles that have wrong lepton numbers are odd under $W$ parity, while the standard model particles are even. Therefore, the lightest wrong-lepton particle (LWP) responsible for dark matter is naturally stabilized. We explicitly show that the non-Hermitian neutral gauge boson ($X^0$) as the LWP cannot be dark matter. However, the LWP as a new neutral fermion ($N_R$) can be dark matter if its mass is in the range $1.9\mathrm{TeV}\le m_{N_R}\le 2.5\mathrm{TeV}$, provided that the new neutral gauge boson ($Z^{\prime }$) mass satisfies $2.2\mathrm{TeV}\le m_{Z^{\prime }}\le 2.5\mathrm{TeV}$. Moreover, the scalar dark matter candidate ($H^{\prime }\simeq {\eta }_3$) that has traditionally been studied is only stabilized by $W$ parity. All the unwanted interactions and vacuums that are often encountered in the 3-3-1 model are naturally suppressed. And, the standing issues on tree-level flavor changing neutral currents and $CPT$ violation also disappear.

Here we give a broad overview of the more natural spectra allowed by the LHC when $UDD$ $R$-parity violation is allowed. Because $R$-parity violation removes the missing energy signals in colliders, the experimental constraints on the gluino, stops, sbottoms, and Higgsinos are relatively mild. We also show that $UDD$ $R$-parity violation and lepton number conservation can be made consistent with grand unification. This feat is achieved through the product unification, $SU(5)\times U(3)$. In this model, mixing of the standard model quarks with additional quarklike particles charged under the $U(3)$ generate a $UDD$ $R$-parity violating operator. Furthermore, these models are also capable of generating a “natural” spectra. The emergence of these more natural low-scale spectra relies heavily on the fact that the gaugino masses are nonuniversal, a natural consequence of product unification.

I calculate, at one loop in staggered chiral perturbation theory, the matrix elements of the complete set of five local operators that may contribute to $B$ mixing both in the standard model and in beyond-the-standard-model theories. Lattice computations of these matrix elements by the Fermilab Lattice/MILC collaborations (and earlier by the HPQCD collaboration) convert a light staggered quark into a naive quark, and construct the relevant four-quark operators as local products of two local bilinears, each involving the naive light quark and the heavy quark. This particular representation of the operators turns out to be important in the chiral calculation, and it results in the presence of “wrong-spin” operators, whose contributions however vanish in the continuum limit. If the matrix elements of all five operators are computed on the lattice, then no additional low-energy constants are required to describe wrong-spin chiral effects.

We investigate the temperature dependence of the Landau gauge gluon and ghost propagators in lattice QCD with two flavors of maximally twisted mass fermions. For these propagators we provide and analyze data which corresponds to pion mass values between 300 and 500 MeV. For the gluon propagator we find that both the longitudinal and transversal component change smoothly in the crossover region, while the ghost propagator exhibits only a very weak temperature dependence. For momenta between 0.4 and 3.0 GeV we give a parametrization for our lattice data. It may serve as input for studies which employ continuum functional methods.

The eigenvalue spectra of staggered fermions with an Adams and/or Hoelbling mass term are studied. The chiralities of the eigenmodes reflect whether the chirality linked to the unflavored approximate (${\gamma }_5\times 1$) or the flavored exact (${\gamma }_5\times {\xi }_5$) staggered symmetry is considered, and which one of the $RR$, $LR$, $RL$, $LL$ eigenmode definitions is used. In either case a sensitivity to the topological charge of the gauge background is found. We discuss how to remove the leading cutoff effects of these actions by means of a properly tuned improvement term and/or the overlap procedure. The combination of Symanzik improvement and link smearing radically improves the properties of the physical branch.

Hadronic charmless $B$ decays to scalar mesons are studied within the framework of QCD factorization (QCDF). Considering two different scenarios for scalar mesons above 1 GeV, we find that the data favor the scenario in which the scalars $a_0(1450)$ and $K_0^{*}(1430)$ are the lowest lying $q\overline{q}$ bound states. This in turn implies a preferred four-quark nature for light scalars below 1 GeV. Assuming $K_0^{*}(1430)$ being a lowest lying $q\overline{s}$ state, we show that the data of $B\to K_0^{*}(1430){\eta }^{({\mathrm{}}^{\prime })}$ and $B\to K_0^{*}(1430)(\rho ,\omega ,\varphi )$ can be accommodated in QCDF without introducing power corrections induced from penguin annihilation, while the predicted $B^{-}\to {\overline{K}}_0^{*0}(1430){\pi }^{-}$ and ${\overline{B}}^0\to K_0^{*-}(1430){\pi }^{+}$ are too small compared to the experiment. In principle, the data of $K_0^{*}(1430)\pi$ modes can be explained if penguin-annihilation induced power corrections are taken into account. However, this will destroy the agreement between theory and experiment for $B\to K_0^{*}(1430)({\eta }^{({\mathrm{}}^{\prime })},\rho ,\omega ,\varphi )$. Contrary to the pseudoscalar meson sector where $B\to K{\eta }^{\prime }$ has the largest rate in 2-body decays of the $B$ meson, we show that $\mathcal{B}(B\to K_0^{*}{\eta }^{\prime })<\mathcal{B}(B\to K_0^{*}\eta )$. The decay ${\overline{B}}^0\to a_0(980{)}^{+}{K}^{-}$ is found to have a rate much smaller than that of ${\overline{B}}^0\to a_0(980{)}^{+}{\pi }^{-}$ in QCDF, while it is the other way around in pQCD. Experimental measurements of these two modes will help discriminate between these two different approaches. Assuming 2-quark bound states for $f_0(980)$ and $f_0(500)$, the observed large rates of $f_0(980)K$ and $f_0(980)K^{*}$ modes can be explained in QCDF with the $f_0(980)-f_0(500)$ mixing angle $\theta$ in the vicinity of 20°. However, this does not necessarily imply that a 4-quark assignment for $f_0(980)$ is ruled out because of extra diagrams contributing to $B\to f_0(980)K^{(*)}$. Irrespective of the mixing angle $\theta$, the predicted branching fraction of $B^0\to f_0(980){\rho }^0$ is far below the Belle measurement, and this needs to be clarified in the future.

A possible supersymmetric interpretation of the new Higgs-like 126 GeV resonance involves a high sfermion mass scale, from tens of TeV to a PeV or above. This scale provides sufficiently large loop corrections to the Higgs mass and can naturally resolve the constraints from flavor-violating observables, even with a generic flavor structure in the sfermion sector. We point out that such high scales could still generate $CP$-violating electric dipole moments at interesting levels due to the enhancement of left-right sfermion mixing. We illustrate this by saturating the light fermion mass corrections from the sfermion threshold, leaving the gaugino masses unconstrained. In this framework, we find that the current electric dipole moment bounds probe energy scales of 0.1 PeV or higher; this is competitive with the reach of ${ϵ}_K$ and more sensitive than other hadronic and leptonic flavor observables. We also consider the sensitivity to higher-dimensional supersymmetric operators in this scenario, including those that lead to proton decay.

This paper contains a summarized calculation of the probability of massive Dirac neutrino radiative decay in an intense magnetic external field where $H\gtrsim H_0=m_e^2{c}^3/e\hslash =4.41\times {10}^{13}\mathrm{G}$ with a degenerated electron gas present. It is demonstrated that the presence of the said medium significantly increases the probability of neutrino decay in the magnetic field, both in cases of relativistic and nonrelativistic neutrinos. The latter conclusion is of interest in connection with the currently developed dark matter theories, according to which dark matter may consist of nonrelativistic neutrinos with mass equal to several keV.

The decay $J/\psi \to \omega p\overline{p}$ has been studied, using $225.3\times {10}^6$ $J/\psi$ events accumulated at BESIII. No significant enhancement near the $p\overline{p}$ invariant-mass threshold [denoted as $X(p\overline{p})$] is observed. The upper limit of the branching fraction $\mathcal{B}(J/\psi \to \omega X(p\overline{p})\to \omega p\overline{p})$ is determined to be $3.9\times {10}^{-6}$ at the 95% confidence level. The branching fraction of $J/\psi \to \omega p\overline{p}$ is measured to be $\mathcal{B}(J/\psi \to \omega p\overline{p})=(9.0\pm 0.2(\mathrm{stat})\pm 0.9(\mathrm{syst}))\times {10}^{-4}$.

Measurements of inclusive jet and dijet production cross sections are presented. Data from LHC proton-proton collisions at $\sqrt{s}=7\mathrm{TeV}$, corresponding to $5.0{\mathrm{fb}}^{-1}$ of integrated luminosity, have been collected with the CMS detector. Jets are reconstructed up to rapidity 2.5, transverse momentum 2 TeV, and dijet invariant mass 5 TeV, using the anti-$k_{\mathrm{T}}$ clustering algorithm with distance parameter $R=0.7$. The measured cross sections are corrected for detector effects and compared to perturbative QCD predictions at next-to-leading order, using five sets of parton distribution functions.

This paper presents a measurement of the $W^{+}{W}^{-}$ production cross section in $pp$ collisions at $\sqrt{s}=7\mathrm{TeV}$. The leptonic decay channels are analyzed using data corresponding to an integrated luminosity of $4.6{\mathrm{fb}}^{-1}$ collected with the ATLAS detector at the Large Hadron Collider. The $W^{+}{W}^{-}$ production cross section $\sigma (pp\to W^{+}{W}^{-}+X)$ is measured to be $51.9\pm 2.0(\mathrm{stat})\pm 3.9(\mathrm{syst})\pm 2.0(\mathrm{lumi})\mathrm{pb}$, compatible with the Standard Model prediction of ${44.7}_{-1.9}^{+2.1}\mathrm{pb}$. A measurement of the normalized fiducial cross section as a function of the leading lepton transverse momentum is also presented. The reconstructed transverse momentum distribution of the leading lepton is used to extract limits on anomalous $WWZ$ and $WW\gamma$ couplings.

We present a measurement of the ratio of the top-quark branching fractions $R=\mathcal{B}(t\to Wb)/\mathcal{B}(t\to Wq)$, where $q$ represents quarks of type $b$, $s$, or $d$, in the final state with a lepton and hadronic jets. The measurement uses $\sqrt{s}=1.96\mathrm{TeV}$ proton-antiproton collision data from $8.7{\mathrm{fb}}^{-1}$ of integrated luminosity collected with the Collider Detector at Fermilab during Run II of the Tevatron. We simultaneously measure $R=0.94\pm 0.09$ ($\mathrm{stat}+\mathrm{syst}$) and the $t\overline{t}$ production cross section ${\sigma }_{t\overline{t}}=7.5\pm 1.0(\mathrm{stat}+\mathrm{syst})\mathrm{pb}$. The magnitude of the Cabibbo-Kobayashi-Maskawa matrix element, $|V_{\mathrm{tb}}|=0.97\pm 0.05$ ($\mathrm{stat}+\mathrm{syst}$) is extracted assuming three generations of quarks, and a lower limit of $|V_{\mathrm{tb}}|>0.89$ at 95% credibility level is set.

The viability of achieving gravitational consistent braneworld models in the framework of a $f(R)$ theory of gravity is investigated. After a careful generalization of the usual junction conditions encompassing the embedding of the 3-brane into a $f(R)$ bulk, we provide a prescription giving the necessary constraints in order to implement the projected second-order effective field equations on the brane.

We study the full backreaction of anti-D3 branes smeared over the tip of the deformed conifold. Requiring the 5-form flux and warp factor at the tip to be that of anti-D3 branes, we find a simple power-counting argument showing that if the 3-form fluxes have no IR singularity, they will be necessarily imaginary anti-self-dual. Hence the only solution with anti-D3 branes at the tip of the conifold that is regular in the IR and the UV is the anti-Klebanov-Strassler solution, and there is no regular solution whose D3-charge is negative in the IR and positive in the UV.

The effect of edges and apertures on the Casimir energy of an arrangement of plates and boundaries can be calculated in terms of an effective nonlocal lower-dimensional field theory that lives on the boundary. This formalism has been developed in a number of previous papers and applied to specific examples with Dirichlet boundary conditions. Here we generalize the formalism to arbitrary boundary conditions. As a specific example, the geometry of a flat plate and a half-plate placed parallel to it is considered for a number of different boundary conditions, and the area-dependent and edge-dependent contributions to the Casimir energy are evaluated. While our results agree with known results for those special cases (such as the Dirichlet and Neumann limits) for which other methods of calculation have been used, our formalism is suitable for general boundary conditions, especially for the diffractive effects.

Here we investigate the axial $w$ quasinormal modes of neutron stars for 18 realistic equations of state, most of them satisfying the $2M_{\odot }$ condition. In particular, we study the influence of the presence of hyperons and quarks in the core of the neutron stars. We have obtained that $w$ modes can be used to distinguish between neutron stars with exotic matter and without exotic matter for compact enough stars. We present phenomenological relations for the frequency and damping times with the compactness of the neutron star for wI and wII modes showing the differences of the stars with exotic matter in the core. Also, we obtain a new phenomenological relation between the real part and the imaginary part of the frequency of the $w$ quasinormal modes, which can be used to estimate the central pressure of the neutron stars. Finally, we study the low compactness limit configuration of fundamental wII modes, and the influence of changes in the core-crust transition pressure. To obtain these results we have developed a new method based on the exterior complex scaling technique with variable angle.