The Absorptive Extra Dimensions

It is well known that gravity and neutrino oscillation can be used to probe large extra dimensions in a braneworld scenario. We argue that neutrino oscillation remains a useful probe even when the extra dimensions are small, because the brane-bulk coupling is likely to be large. Neutrino oscillation in the presence of a strong brane-bulk coupling is vastly different from the usual case of a weak coupling. In particular, some active neutrinos could be absorbed by the bulk when they oscillate from one kind to another, a signature which can be taken as the presence of an extra dimension. In a very large class of models which we shall discuss, the amount of absorption for all neutrino oscillations is controlled by a single parameter, a property which distinguishes extra dimensions from other mechanisms for losing neutrino fluxes.Comment: Introduction enlarged; conclusions added. To appear in Phys. Rev.

Sterile Neutrino as a Bulk Neutrino

If light sterile neutrinos are needed to understand the neutrino puzzles, as is currently indicated, a major theoretical challenge is to understand why its mass is so small. It is a more serious problem than understanding the small mass of the familiar neutrinos. We discuss a new way to solve this problem by identifying the sterile neutrino as gauge neutral fermion propagating in the bulk of a higher dimensional theory, with bulk size of order of a millimeter. The smallness of its mass is then a consequence of the size of the extra dimension and does not need the introduction of new symmetries. We present a realistic model for neutrino masses and mixings that implements this idea.Comment: 13 pages, no figures; minor typos correcte

Effect of Plastic Deformation on the Magnetic Properties 304 Stainless Steel During Tensile Loading

The present investigation addresses effect of tensile deformation on the magnetic properties of virgin 304SS as well as cold rolled samples containing a low volume fraction of 12% and 17% martensite. In-situ Non-destructive evaluation (NDE) techniques by magnetic Barkhausen emission (MBE) and magnetic hysteresis loop (MHL) measurement were used for evaluation of plastic deformation during tensile loading. Both the techniques indicated different stages of variation in magnetic properties with progressive plastic deformation. The trend of coercivity and Barkhausen measurements also throw light on the ductile and brittle fracture occurring in virgin and cold worked samples with validation using SEM fractography

Naturally Small Seesaw Neutrino Mass with No New Physics Beyond the TeV Scale

If there is no new physics beyond the TeV energy scale, such as in a theory of large extra dimensions, the smallness of the seesaw neutrino mass, i.e. $m_\nu = m_D^2/m_N$, cannot be explained by a very large $m_N$. In contrast to previous attempts to find an alternative mechanism for a small $m_\nu$, I show how a solution may be obtained in a simple extension of the Standard Model, without using any ingredient supplied by the large extra dimensions. It is also experimentally testable at future accelerators.Comment: 9 pages, in final form for PR

Magnetic behavior of nanocrystalline ErCo2

We have investigated the magnetic behavior of the nanocrystalline form of a well-known Laves phase compound, ErCo2 - the bulk form of which has been known to undergo an interesting first-order ferrimagnetic ordering near 32 K - synthesized by high-energy ball-milling. It is found that, in these nanocrystallites, Co exhibits ferromagnetic order at room temperature as inferred from the magnetization data. However, the magnetic transition temperature for Er sublattice remains essentially unaffected as though the (Er)4f-Co(3d) coupling is weak on Er magnetism. The net magnetic moment as measured at high fields, sat at 120 kOe, is significantly reduced with respect to that for the bulk in the ferrimagnetically ordered state and possible reasons are outlined. We have also compared the magnetocaloric behavior for the bulk and the nano particles.Comment: JPCM, in pres

Possible Z-width probe of a "brane-world" scenario for neutrino masses

The possibility that the accurately known value of the Z width might furnish information about the coupling of two neutrinos to the Majoron (Nambu-Goldstone boson of spontaneous lepton number violation) is proposed and investigated in detail. Both the "ordinary" case and the case in which one adopts a "brane" world picture with the Majoron free to travel in extra dimensions are studied. Bounds on the dimensionless coupling constants are obtained, allowing for any number of extra dimensions and any intrinsic mass scale. These bounds may be applied to a variety of different Majoron models. If a technically natural see-saw model is adopted, the predicted coupling constants are far below these upper bounds. In addition, for this natural model, the effect of extra dimensions is to decrease the predicted partial Z width, the increase due to many Kaluza-Klein excitations being compensated by the decrease of their common coupling constant.Comment: RevTeX, 12 pages, 3 figure

Neutrino Oscillations via the Bulk

We investigate the possibility that the large mixing of neutrinos is induced by their large coupling to a five-dimensional bulk neutrino. In the strong coupling limit the model is exactly soluble. It gives rise to an oscillation amplitude whose squared-mass difference is independent of the channel, thus making it impossible to explain both the solar and the atmospheric neutrino oscillations simultaneously.Comment: References added and rearranged, typos corrected, a graph added, and more detailed explanations provided. To appear in Physical Review

Magnetic behavior of nano crystals of a spin-chain system, Ca3Co2O6: Absence of multiple steps in the low temperature isothermal magnetization

We report that the major features in the temperature dependence of dc and ac magnetization of a well-known spin-chain compound, Ca3Co2O6, which has been known to exhibit two complex magnetic transitions due to geometrical frustration (one near 24 K and the other near 10 K), are found to be qualitatively unaffected in its nano form synthesized by high-energy ball-milling. However, the multiple steps in isothermal magnetization - a topic of current interest in low-dimensional systems - known for the bulk form well below 10 K is absent in the nano particles. We believe that this finding will be useful to the understanding of the 'step' magnetization behavior of such spin-chain systems.Comment: Phys. Rev. B (Rapid Communications), in pres

Minimal SUSY SO(10) model and predictions for neutrino mixings and leptonic CP violation

We discuss a minimal Supersymmetric SO(10) model where B-L symmetry is broken by a {\bf 126} dimensional Higgs multiplet which also contributes to fermion masses in conjunction with a {\bf 10} dimensional superfield. This minimal Higgs choice provides a partial unification of neutrino flavor structure with that of quarks and has been shown to predict all three neutrino mixing angles and the solar mass splitting in agreement with observations, provided one uses the type II seesaw formula for neutrino masses. In this paper we generalize this analysis to include arbitrary CP phases in couplings and vevs. We find that (i) the predictions for neutrino mixings are similar with $U_{e3}\simeq 0.18$ as before and other parameters in a somewhat bigger range and (ii) that to first order in the quark mixing parameter $\lambda$ (the Cabibbo angle), the leptonic mixing matrix is CP conserving. We also find that in the absence of any higher dimensional contributions to fermion masses, the CKM phase is different from that of the standard model implying that there must be new contributions to quark CP violation from the supersymmetry breaking sector. Inclusion of higher dimensional terms however allows the standard model CKM phase to be maintained.Comment: 22 pages, 6 figure

Baryogenesis via Leptogenesis in presence of cosmic strings

We study the effect on leptogenesis due to $B-L$ cosmic strings of a $U(1)_{B-L}$ extension of the Standard Model. The disappearance of closed loops of $B-L$ cosmic strings can produce heavy right handed neutrinos, $N_R$'s, whose CP-asymmetric decay in out-of-thermal equilibrium condition can give rise to a net lepton ($L$) asymmetry which is then converted, due to sphaleron transitions, to a Baryon ($B$) asymmetry. This is studied by using the relevant Boltzmann equations and including the effects of both thermal and string generated non-thermal $N_R$'s. We explore the parameter region spanned by the effective light neutrino mass parameter $\tilde{m}_1$, the mass $M_1$ of the lightest of the heavy right-handed neutrinos (or equivalently the Yukawa coupling $h_1$) and the scale of $B-L$ symmetry breaking, $\eta_{B-L}$, and show that there exist ranges of values of these parameters, in particular with \eta_{B-L} > 10^{11}\gev and h_1\gsim 0.01, for which the cosmic string generated non-thermal $N_R$'s can give the dominant contribution to, and indeed produce, the observed Baryon Asymmetry of the Universe when the purely thermal leptogenesis mechanism is not sufficient. We also discuss how, depending on the values of $\eta_{B-L}$, $\tilde{m}_1$ and $h_1$, our results lead to upper bounds on $\sin\delta$, where $\delta$ is the the CP violating phase that determines the CP asymmetry in the decay of the heavy right handed neutrino responsible for generating the $L$-asymmetry.Comment: 23 pages, 5 figures, discussions added, journal version, to appear in NP