Fermion and Higgs Masses and the AGUT Model

We present two rather differently based predictions for the quark and lepton spectrum: One provides a rather successful fit to the mass suppressions---the well known fermion mass hierarchy---interpreted as due to most mass terms needing to violate approximately conserved quantum numbers corresponding to the AGUT group $SMG^3\times U(1)_f$. This is actually, under certain conditions, the maximal group transforming the known 45 Weyl components of the quark and leptons into each other. From the fit to the fermion spectrum, we get a picture of the series of Higgs fields causing the breakdown (presumably at the Planck scale) of this AGUT to the Standard Model and, thus, providing the small masses of all quarks and leptons except for the top quark. We separately predict the top quark mass to be $173 \pm 5$ GeV and the Higgs mass to be $135 \pm 9$ GeV, from the assumption that there be two degenerate minima in the effective potential for the Weinberg Salam Higgs field with the second one at the Planck field strength.Comment: 6 page LaTeX file plus 1 postscript figure and aipproc style file, uses epsfig.sty; to appear in the Proceedings of Beyond the Standard Model V, Balholm, Norway, 29 April - 4 May 199

Products of Random Matrices

We derive analytic expressions for infinite products of random 2x2 matrices. The determinant of the target matrix is log-normally distributed, whereas the remainder is a surprisingly complicated function of a parameter characterizing the norm of the matrix and a parameter characterizing its skewness. The distribution may have importance as an uncommitted prior in statistical image analysis.Comment: 9 pages, 1 figur

The WIYN Open Cluster Study Photometric Binary Survey: Initial Findings for NGC 188

The WIYN open cluster study (WOCS) has been working to yield precise magnitudes in the Johnson-Kron-Cousins UBVRI system for all stars in the field of a selection of ``prototypical'' open clusters. Additionally, WOCS is using radial velocities to obtain orbit solutions for all cluster binary stars with periods of less than 1000 days. Recently, WOCS is being expanded to include the near-infrared JHK_s (deep ground-based plus 2MASS) and mid-infrared ([3.6], [4.5], [5.8], [8.0]) photometry from Spitzer/IRAC observations. This multi-wavelength data (0.3--8.0 microns) allows us photometrically to identify binaries, with mass ratios from 1.0--0.3, across a wide range of primary masses. The spectral energy distribution (SED) fitter by Robitaille et al. (2007) is used to fit the fluxes of 10--12 bands, converted from the observed magnitudes, to Kurucz stellar models. Using this photometric technique, we find that NGC 188 has a binary fraction of 36--49% and provide a star-by-star comparison to the WOCS radial velocity-based binary study.Comment: 2 pages, 2 figures, Conference Proceedings from "Dynamical Evolution of Dense Stellar Systems'', IAU Symposium 246, Eds. E. Vesperini, M. Giersz, & A. Sill