Nuclides as a liquid phase of SU(2)L×SU(2)RSU(2)_L \times SU(2)_R chiral perturbation theory I: emergence of pion-less SU(2) χ\chi PT

The Standard Model of particle physics, augmented with neutrino mixing, is at least very nearly the complete theory of interactions of known particles at energies accessible to Nature on Earth. Candidate effective theories of nuclear structure must therefore reflect SM symmetries, especially the chiral global $SU(2)_L \times SU(2)_R$ symmetry of two-massless-quark QCD. For ground-state nuclei, SU(2) chiral perturbation theory (XPT) enables perturbation in inverse powers of $\Lambda_{XSB}\simeq 1 GeV$, with analytic operators renormalized to all loop orders. We show that pion-less "Static Chiral Nucleon Liquids" (SXNL) emerge as a liquid phase of SU(2) XPT of protons, neutrons and 3 Nambu-Goldstone boson pions. Far-IR pions decouple from SXNL, simplifying the derivation of saturated nuclear matter and microscopic liquid drops (ground-state nuclides). We trace to the global symmetries of two-massless-quark QCD the power of pion-less SU(2) XPT to capture experimental ground-state properties of certain nuclides with even parity, spin zero, even proton number Z, and neutron number N. We derive the SXNL effective SU(2) XPT Lagrangian, including all order $\Lambda_{XSB},\Lambda^0_{XSB}$ operators. These include: all 4-nucleon operators that survive Fierz rearrangement in the non-relativistic limit, and effective Lorentz-vector iso-vector neutral "$\rho$-exchange" operators. SXNL motivate nuclear matter as non-topological solitons at zero pressure: the Nuclear Liquid Drop Model and Bethe-Weizsacker Semi-Empirical Mass Formula emerge in an explicit Thomas-Fermi construction provided in the companion paper. For chosen nuclides, nuclear Density Functional and Skyrme models are justified to order $\Lambda_{\chi SB}^0$. We conjecture that inclusion of higher order operators will result in accurate "natural" Skyrme, No-Core-Shell, and neutron star models

Macro Dark Matter

Dark matter is a vital component of the current best model of our universe, $\Lambda$CDM. There are leading candidates for what the dark matter could be (e.g. weakly-interacting massive particles, or axions), but no compelling observational or experimental evidence exists to support these particular candidates, nor any beyond-the-Standard-Model physics that might produce such candidates. This suggests that other dark matter candidates, including ones that might arise in the Standard Model, should receive increased attention. Here we consider a general class of dark matter candidates with characteristic masses and interaction cross-sections characterized in units of grams and cm$^2$, respectively -- we therefore dub these macroscopic objects as Macros. Such dark matter candidates could potentially be assembled out of Standard Model particles (quarks and leptons) in the early universe. A combination of Earth-based, astrophysical, and cosmological observations constrain a portion of the Macro parameter space. A large region of parameter space remains, most notably for nuclear-dense objects with masses in the range $55 - 10^{17}$ g and $2\times10^{20} - 4\times10^{24}$ g, although the lower mass window is closed for Macros that destabilize ordinary matter.Comment: 13 pages, 1 table, 4 figures. Submitted to MNRAS. v3: corrected small errors and a few points were made more clear, v4: included CMB bounds on dark matter-photon coupling from Wilkinson et al. (2014) and references added. Final revision matches published versio

Liquid Phases in SU(3) Chiral Perturbation Theory: Drops of Strange Chiral Nucleon Liquid & Ordinary Chiral Heavy Nuclear Liquid

Chiral SU(3) Perturbation Theory (SU3XPT) identifies hadrons as the building blocks of strongly interacting matter at low densities and temperatures. We show that it admits two co-existing chiral nucleon liquid phases at zero external pressure with well-defined surfaces: 1) ordinary microscopic chiral heavy nuclear liquid drops (XNL) and 2) a new Strange Chiral Nucleon Liquid (SXNL) phase with both microscopic and macroscopic drop sizes. Liquid drops of both XNL and SXNL are simultaneously solutions to the SU3XPT semi-classical equations of motion and obey all relevant CVC and PCAC equations. Axial-vector currents are conserved inside macroscopic drops of SXNL, a new form of baryonic matter with zero electric charge density, which is by nature "dark". The numerical values of all SU3XPT coefficients are used to fit current scattering experiments and ordinary XNL drops (identified with the ground state of ordinary even-even spin-zero spherical closed-shell nuclei). SXNL then also emerges (i.e. without new adjustable parameters). For certain SU3XPT coefficients, finite microscopic and macroscopic drops of SXNL may be the ground state of a collection of nucleons: ordinary heavy nuclei may be meta-stable, while oceans of SXNL may force qualitative and experimentally observable changes to the neutron star equation of state