Spin asymmetries in jet-hyperon production at LHC

We consider polarized Lambda hyperon production in proton-proton scattering, p p -> (\Lambda^\uparrow jet) jet X, in the kinematical region of the LHC experiments, in particular the ALICE experiment. We present a new Lambda polarization observable that arises from the Sivers effect in the fragmentation process. It can be large even at midrapidity and therefore, is of interest for high energy hadron collider experiments. Apart from its potential to shed light on the mechanisms behind the phenomenon of Lambda polarization arising in unpolarized hadronic collisions, the new observable in principle also allows to test the possible color flow dependence of single spin asymmetries and the (non)universality of transverse momentum dependent fragmentation functions.Comment: 11 pages, 10 eps figures; minor modifications, conclusions unchanged, version to be publishe

Higgs Branching Ratios in Constrained Minimal and Next-to-Minimal Supersymmetry Scenarios Surveyed

In the CMSSM the heaviest scalar and pseudo-scalar Higgs bosons decay largely into b-quarks and tau-leptons because of the large $\tan\beta$ values favored by the relic density. In the NMSSM the number of possible decay modes is much richer. In addition to the CMSSM-like scenarios, the decay of the heavy Higgs bosons is preferentially into top quark pairs (if kinematically allowed), lighter Higgs bosons or neutralinos, leading to invisible decays. We provide a scan over the NMSSM parameter space to project the 6D parameter space of the Higgs sector on the 3D space of the Higgs masses to determine the range of branching ratios as function of the Higgs boson mass for all Higgs bosons. Specific LHC benchmark points are proposed, which represent the salient NMSSM features.Comment: 24 pages, 3 figures, this version is accepted by PLB after minor modification

Calculation of fragmentation functions in two-hadron semi-inclusive processes

We investigate the properties of interference fragmentation functions arising from the emission of two leading hadrons inside the same jet for inclusive lepton-nucleon deep-inelastic scattering. Using an extended spectator model for the mechanism of the hadronization, we give a complete calculation and numerical estimates for the examples of a proton-pion pair produced with invariant mass on the Roper resonance, and of two pions produced with invariant mass close to the $\rho$ mass. We discuss azimuthal angular dependence of the leading order cross section to point up favourable conditions for extracting transversity from experimental data.Comment: 5 pages, 3 figures in .eps format, AIP and epsfig styles included, to appear in proceedings of "Second Workshop on Physics with an Electron Polarized Light Ion Collider", MIT, Sept. 14-16, 200

Perspectives of direct Detection of supersymmetric Dark Matter in the NMSSM

In the Next-to-Minimal-Supersymmetric-Standard-Model (NMSSM) the lightest supersymmetric particle (LSP) is a candidate for the dark matter (DM) in the universe. It is a mixture from the various gauginos and Higgsinos and can be bino-, Higgsino- or singlino-dominated. Singlino-dominated LSPs can have very low cross sections below the neutrino background from coherent neutrino scattering which is limiting the sensitivity of future direct DM search experiments. However, previous studies suggested that the combination of both, the spin-dependent (SD) and spin-independent (SI) searches are sensitive in complementary regions of parameter space, so considering both searches will allow to explore practically the whole parameter space of the NMSSM. In this letter, the different scenarios are investigated with a new scanning technique, which reveals that significant regions of the NMSSM parameter space cannot be explored, even if one considers both, SI and SD, searches.Comment: 22 pages, 3 figures, this version is accepted by PLB after minor modification

Stellar Associations and their Field East of LMC 4 in the Large Magellanic Cloud

We report about the stellar content and the luminosity and mass functions of three stellar associations and their field located on the north-east edge of the super-bubble LMC 4 in the Large Magellanic Cloud.Comment: To be appeared in the meeting Proceedings of ``Modes of Star Formation and the Origin of Field Populations'', Heidelberg, Germany, October 2000; to be published in the ASP Conference Series, edited by E. K. Grebel and W. Brandne

On a novel approach for optimizing composite materials panel using surrogate models

This paper describes an optimization procedure to design thermoplastic composite panels under axial compressive load conditions. Minimum weight is the goal. The panel design is subject to buckling constraints. The presence of the bending-twisting coupling and of particular boundary conditions does not allow an analytical solution for the critical buckling load. Surrogate models are used to approximate the buckling response of the plate in a fast and reliable way. Therefore, two surrogate models are compared to study their effectiveness in composite optimization. The first one is a linear approximation based on the buckling constitutive equation. The second consists in the application of the Kriging surrogate. Constraints given from practical blending rules are also introduced in the optimization. Discrete values of ply thicknesses is a requirement. An ad-hoc discrete optimization strategy is developed, which enables to handle discrete variables

Double transverse spin asymmetries in vector boson production

We investigate a helicity non-flip double transverse spin asymmetry in vector boson production in hadron-hadron scattering, which was first considered by Ralston and Soper at the tree level. It does not involve transversity functions and in principle also arises in W-boson production for which we present the expressions. The asymmetry requires observing the transverse momentum of the vector boson, but it is not suppressed by explicit inverse powers of a large energy scale. However, as we will show, inclusion of Sudakov factors causes suppression of the asymmetry, which increases with energy. Moreover, the asymmetry is shown to be approximately proportional to x_1 g_1(x_1) x_2 \bar g_1(x_2), which gives rise to additional suppression at small values of the light cone momentum fractions. This implies that it is negligible for Z or W production and is mainly of interest for \gamma^* at low energies. We also compare the asymmetry with other types of double transverse spin asymmetries and discuss how to disentangle them.Comment: 12 pages, Revtex, 2 Postscript figures, uses aps.sty, epsf.sty; figures replaced, a few minor other correction

ORFEUS II echelle spectra: Absorption by H_2 in the LMC

We present the first detection of molecular hydrogen (H_2) UV absorption profiles on the line of sight to the LMC. The star LH 10:3120 in the LMC was measured with the ORFEUS telescope and the Tuebingen echelle spectrograph during the space shuttle mission of Nov./Dec. 1996. 16 absorption lines from the Lyman band are used to derive the column densities of H_2 for the lowest 5 rotational states in the LMC gas. For these states we find a total column density of N(H_2)=6.6 x 10^18$ cm^-2 on this individual line of sight. We obtain equivalent excitation temperatures of T < 50 K for the rotational ground state and T = 470 K for 0 < J < 6 by fitting the population densities of the rotational states to theoretical Boltzmann distributions. We conclude that UV pumping dominates the population of the higher rotational levels, as known from the H_2 gas in the Milky Way. (Research supported in part by the DARA)Comment: Astronomy & Astrophysics, Letter, in pres

Initial-State Interactions in the Unpolarized Drell-Yan Process

We show that initial-state interactions contribute to the $\cos 2 \phi$ distribution in unpolarized Drell-Yan lepton pair production $p p$ and $p \bar p \to \ell^+ \ell^- X$, without suppression. The asymmetry is expressed as a product of chiral-odd distributions $h_1^\perp(x_1,\bm{p}_\perp^2)\times \bar h_1^\perp(x_2,\bm{k}_\perp^2)$, where the quark-transversity function $h_1^\perp(x,\bm{p}_\perp^2)$ is the transverse momentum dependent, light-cone momentum distribution of transversely polarized quarks in an {\it unpolarized} proton. We compute this (naive) $T$-odd and chiral-odd distribution function and the resulting $\cos 2 \phi$ asymmetry explicitly in a quark-scalar diquark model for the proton with initial-state gluon interaction. In this model the function $h_1^\perp(x,\bm{p}_\perp^2)$ equals the $T$-odd (chiral-even) Sivers effect function $f^\perp_{1T}(x,\bm{p}_\perp^2)$. This suggests that the single-spin asymmetries in the SIDIS and the Drell-Yan process are closely related to the $\cos 2 \phi$ asymmetry of the unpolarized Drell-Yan process, since all can arise from the same underlying mechanism. This provides new insight regarding the role of quark and gluon orbital angular momentum as well as that of initial- and final-state gluon exchange interactions in hard QCD processes.Comment: 22 pages, 6 figure