Mixing It Up With MT2: Unbiased Mass Measurements at Hadron Colliders

Recently, much progress has been made on techniques to measure the masses of new particles with partially-invisible decays at a hadron collider. We examine for the first time the realistic application of MT2-based measurement methods to a fully hadronic final state from a symmetric two-step decay chain with maximal combinatorial uncertainty. Several problems arise in such an analysis: the MT2 variables are powerful but fragile, with shallow edges that are easily washed out or faked by ubiquitous combinatorics background. Traditional methods of both cleaning up the distribution and determining edge position can fail badly. To perform successful mass measurements we introduce several new techniques: the Edge-to-Bump method of extracting an edge from a distribution by analyzing a distribution of fits rather than a single fit; a very simple yet high-yield method for determining decay-chain assignments event-by-event; and a systematic procedure to obtain MT2 edge measurements in the presence of heavy combinatorics background, they key element being the parallel use of at least two independent methods of reducing combinatorics background to avoid fake measurements. All of these techniques are developed in a Monte Carlo study of the decay gluino gluino -> 2 sbottom + 2 b -> 4 b + 2 chi_0^1 and verified in a second blind study with a different spectrum. In both cases, the gluino and sbottom masses are measured to a precision of ~ 10% with O(100 fb^{-1}) at the LHC14 (assuming pessimistic b-tag efficiencies).Comment: 35 pages, 12 figure

From ‘Sandals and Beards to Sophisticated Urbanites’: The Opportunities and Management Dilemmas of a Dynamic Wildlife Tourism Sector

Wildlife tourism has undoubtedly come of age. If you consider it as ‘an old hat niche product’, you may think again. The last five years has seen an incremental growth in the number of different types of commercial wildlife watching activities developed, the number of tourism businesses offering these activities worldwide and the number of tourists engaging in them either as the primary motivation for travel or as a day trip whilst on a standard rest and relaxation holiday. The purpose of this paper is to highlight the recent changes in the sector and suggest the contemporary management issues that industry and academia must research and address

Tiger, tiger burning bright:is tourism a blessing or a blight?

The number of tigers have declined from 100,000 a century ago to only c3,200 today and are thus a focus for conservation and last-chance tourism. However tiger watching tourism is seen as another pressure on their survival and thus India has been the first country to announce plans to reduce/regulate tourism in its tiger reserves. This has re-opened an international discussion on whether tourism is a positive or negative force for the conservation of flagship species. Using India as a case study, this paper sets out the arguments for tiger tourism in order to invite further academic and industry comment

The Double-Dark Portal

In most models of the dark sector, dark matter is charged under some new symmetry to make it stable. We explore the possibility that not just dark matter, but also the force carrier connecting it to the visible sector is charged under this symmetry. This dark mediator then acts as a Double-Dark Portal. We realize this setup in the \emph{dark mediator Dark matter} model (dmDM), featuring a fermionic DM candidate $\chi$ with Yukawa couplings to light scalars $\phi_i$. The scalars couple to SM quarks via the operator $\bar q q \phi_i^* \phi_j/\Lambda_{ij}$. This can lead to large direct detection signals via the $2\rightarrow3$ process $\chi N \rightarrow \chi N \phi$ if one of the scalars has mass $\lesssim 10$ keV. For dark matter Yukawa couplings $y_\chi \sim 10^{-3} - 10^{-2}$, dmDM features a thermal relic dark matter candidate while also implementing the SIDM scenario for ameliorating inconsistencies between dwarf galaxy simulations and observations. We undertake the first systematic survey of constraints on light scalars coupled to the SM via the above operator. The strongest constraints are derived from a detailed examination of the light mediator's effects on stellar astrophysics. LHC experiments and cosmological considerations also yield important bounds. Observations of neutron star cooling exclude the minimal model with one dark mediator, but a scenario with two dark mediators remains viable and can give strong direct detection signals. We explore the direct detection consequences of this scenario and find that a heavy $\mathcal{O}(100)$ GeV dmDM candidate fakes different $\mathcal{O}(10)$ GeV WIMPs at different experiments. Large regions of dmDM parameter space are accessible above the irreducible neutrino background.Comment: 24 pages, 19 figures, + references and appendices, update the SIDM discussion and reference

Practical Sparse Matrices in C++ with Hybrid Storage and Template-Based Expression Optimisation

Despite the importance of sparse matrices in numerous fields of science, software implementations remain difficult to use for non-expert users, generally requiring the understanding of underlying details of the chosen sparse matrix storage format. In addition, to achieve good performance, several formats may need to be used in one program, requiring explicit selection and conversion between the formats. This can be both tedious and error-prone, especially for non-expert users. Motivated by these issues, we present a user-friendly and open-source sparse matrix class for the C++ language, with a high-level application programming interface deliberately similar to the widely used MATLAB language. This facilitates prototyping directly in C++ and aids the conversion of research code into production environments. The class internally uses two main approaches to achieve efficient execution: (i) a hybrid storage framework, which automatically and seamlessly switches between three underlying storage formats (compressed sparse column, Red-Black tree, coordinate list) depending on which format is best suited and/or available for specific operations, and (ii) a template-based meta-programming framework to automatically detect and optimise execution of common expression patterns. Empirical evaluations on large sparse matrices with various densities of non-zero elements demonstrate the advantages of the hybrid storage framework and the expression optimisation mechanism.Comment: extended and revised version of an earlier conference paper arXiv:1805.0338

Singlet-Stabilized Minimal Gauge Mediation

We propose Singlet Stabilized Minimal Gauge Mediation as a simple ISS-based model of Direct Gauge Mediation which avoids both light gauginos and Landau poles. The hidden sector is a massive s-confining SQCD that is distinguished by a minimal SU(5) flavor group. The uplifted vacuum is stabilized by coupling the meson to an additional singlet sector with its own U(1) gauge symmetry via non-renormalizable interactions suppressed by a higher scale Lambda_UV in the electric theory. This generates a nonzero VEV for the singlet meson via the inverted hierarchy mechanism, but requires tuning to a precision ~ (Lambda/Lambda_UV)^2, which is ~ 10^{-4}. In the course of this analysis we also outline some simple model-building rules for stabilizing uplifted ISS models, which lead us to conclude that meson deformations are required (or at least heavily favored) to stabilize the adjoint component of the magnetic meson.Comment: 26 pages, 3 figures (fixed typos

Drug Policy Alternatives- A Response from the Bench

The article begins by discussing the tremendous financial and social cost incurred by drug use and regulation. It then discusses some positive efforts to deal with the problem such as legalization and decriminalization. The article then states that it will take time to figure out the extent of legalization needed, and until that is figured out we need to focus efforts on harm reduction. The article then addresses whether the constitution bans drugs at all. Finally, the article concludes by stating that we can never hope to fully eliminate drug use, we can only hope to contain it, and gives some suggestions that will begin the path to controlling drug use