Isolating Triggered Star Formation

Galaxy pairs provide a potentially powerful means of studying triggered star formation from galaxy interactions. We use a large cosmological N-body simulation coupled with a well-tested semi-analytic substructure model to demonstrate that the majority of galaxies in close pairs reside within cluster or group-size halos and therefore represent a biased population, poorly suited for direct comparison to ``field'' galaxies. Thus, the frequent observation that some types of galaxies in pairs have redder colors than ``field'' galaxies is primarily a selection effect. We select galaxy pairs that are isolated in their dark matter halos with respect to other massive subhalos (N=2 halos) and a control sample of isolated galaxies (N=1 halos) for comparison. We then apply these selection criteria to a volume-limited subset of the 2dF Galaxy Redshift Survey with M_Bj <= -19 and obtain the first clean measure of the typical fraction of galaxies affected by triggered star formation and the average elevation in the star formation rate. We find that 24% (30.5%) of these L^\star and sub-L^{\star} galaxies in isolated 50 (30) kpc/h pairs exhibit star formation that is boosted by a factor of >~ 5 above their average past value, while only 10% of isolated galaxies in the control sample show this level of enhancement. Thus, 14% (20 %) of the galaxies in these close pairs show clear triggered star formation. The isolation criteria we develop provide a means to constrain star formation and feedback prescriptions in hydrodynamic simulations and a very general method of understanding the importance of triggered star formation in a cosmological context. (Abridged.)Comment: 12 pages, 10 figures, emulateapj format, accepted by Ap

Measurement of the Neutral B Meson-B Bar Meson Oscillation Frequency Using Dilepton Events at BABAR

This dissertation describes the measurement of the B{sup 0}{bar B}{sup 0} oscillation frequency {Delta}m{sub d} with a sample of 122 x 10{sup 6} B{bar B} pairs collected with the BABAR detector at the PEP-II asymmetric B Factory at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center. A fully inclusive approach is used to select dilepton events in which B meson decays semileptonically and the lepton's charge is employed to identify the flavor of each B meson. The oscillation frequency {Delta}m{sub d} is extracted from the time evolution of the dilepton events. A maximum likelihood fit to the same sign and opposite sign events simultaneously gives {Delta}m{sub d} = (0.485 {+-} 0.009(stat.) {+-} 0.010(syst.)) ps{sup 1} where the first uncertainty is statistical and the second is systematic. This is one of the single most precise measurements of the B{sup 0}{bar B}{sup 0} oscillation frequency to date

B Decays Involving Light Mesons

Recent BABAR results for decays of B-mesons to combinations of non-charm mesons are presented. This includes B decays to two vector mesons, B {yields} {eta}{prime}({pi}, K, {rho}) modes, and a comprehensive Dalitz Plot analysis of B {yields} KKK decays

TASI 2006 Lectures on Leptogenesis

The origin of the asymmetry between matter and anti-matter of the Universe has been one of the great challenges in particle physics and cosmology. Leptogenesis as a mechanism for generating the cosmological baryon asymmetry of the Universe has gained significant interests ever since the advent of the evidence of non-zero neutrino masses. In these lectures presented at TASI 2006, I review various realizations of leptogenesis and allude to recent developments in this subject

Searching for Z′Z' bosons decaying to gluons

The production and decay of a new heavy vector boson, a chromophilic Z{prime} vector boson, is described. The chromophilic Z{prime} couples only to two gluons, but its two-body decays are absent, leading to a dominant decay mode of Z{prime} {yields} q{bar q}g. The unusual nature of the interaction predicts a cross-section which grows with m{sub Z{prime}} for a fixed coupling and an accompanying gluon with a coupling that rises with its energy. We study the t{bar t}g decay mode, proposing distinct reconstruction techniques for the observation of an excess and for the measurement of m{sub Z{prime}}. We estimate the sensitivity of current experimental datasets

Deep Underground Science and Engineering Lab: S1 Dark Matter Working Group

A study of the current status of WIMP dark matter searches has been made in the context of scientific and technical planning for a Deep Underground Science and Engineering Laboratory (DUSEL) in the U.S. The table of contents follows: 1. Overview 2. WIMP Dark Matter: Cosmology, Astrophysics, and Particle Physics 3. Direct Detection of WIMPs 4. Indirect Detection of WIMPs 5. Dark Matter Candidates and New Physics in the Laboratory 6. Synergies with Other Sub-Fields 7. Direct Detection Experiments: Status and Future Prospects 8. Infrastructure 9. International Context 10. Summary and Outlook 11. AcknowledgmentsComment: Final working group report of 17 Feb 2007 updated to address reviewer comments (Latex, 32 pages

Galaxy Mergers and Dark Matter Halo Mergers in LCDM: Mass, Redshift, and Mass-Ratio Dependence

We employ a high-resolution LCDM N-body simulation to present merger rate predictions for dark matter halos and investigate how common merger-related observables for galaxies - such as close pair counts, starburst counts, and the morphologically disturbed fraction - likely scale with luminosity, stellar mass, merger mass ratio, and redshift from z = 0 to z = 4. We provide a simple 'universal' fitting formula that describes our derived merger rates for dark matter halos a function of dark halo mass, merger mass ratio, and redshift, and go on to predict galaxy merger rates using number density-matching to associate halos with galaxies. For example, we find that the instantaneous merger rate of m/M &gt; 0.3 mass ratio events into typical L {approx}&gt; fL{sub *} galaxies follows the simple relation dN/dt {approx_equal} 0.03(1+f)Gyr{sup -1} (1+z){sup 2.1}. Despite the rapid increase in merger rate with redshift, only a small fraction of &gt; 0.4L{sub *} high-redshift galaxies ({approx} 3% at z = 2) should have experienced a major merger (m/M &gt; 0.3) in the very recent past (t &lt; 100 Myr). This suggests that short-lived, merger-induced bursts of star formation should not contribute significantly to the global star formation rate at early times, in agreement with observational indications. In contrast, a fairly high fraction ({approx} 20%) of those z = 2 galaxies should have experienced a morphologically transformative merger within a virial dynamical time. We compare our results to observational merger rate estimates from both morphological indicators and pair-fraction based determinations between z = 0-2 and show that they are consistent with our predictions. However, we emphasize that great care must be made in these comparisons because the predicted observables depend very sensitively on galaxy luminosity, redshift, overall mass ratio, and uncertain relaxation timescales for merger remnants. We show that the majority of bright galaxies at z = 3 should have undergone a major merger (&gt; 0.3) in the last 700 Myr and conclude that mergers almost certainly play an important role in delivering baryons and influencing the kinematic properties of Lyman Break Galaxies (LBGs)