949 research outputs found
Leptonic universality breaking in Upsilon decays as a probe of new physics
In this work we examine the possible existence of new physics beyond the
standard model which could modify the branching fractions of the leptonic
(mainly tauonic) decays of bottomonium vector resonances below the
threshold. The decay width is factorized as the product of two pieces: a) the
probability of an intermediate pseudoscalar color-singlet state
(coupling to the dominant Fock state of the Upsilon via a magnetic dipole
transition) and a soft (undetected) photon; b) the annihilation width of the
pair into two leptons, mediated by a non-standard CP-odd Higgs boson
of mass about 10 GeV, introducing a quadratic dependence on the lepton mass in
the partial width. The process would be unwittingly ascribed to the
leptonic channel thereby (slightly) breaking lepton universality. A possible
mixing of the pseudoscalar Higgs and bottomonium resonances is also considered.
Finally, several experimental signatures to check out the validity of the
conjecture are discussed.Comment: LaTeX, 22 pages, 2 EPS figure
Long-term chromospheric activity in southern M dwarfs: Gl 229 A and Gl 752 A
Several late-type stars present activity cycles similar to that of the Sun.
However, these cycles have been mostly studied in F to K stars. Due to their
small intrinsic brightness, M dwarfs are not usually the targets of long-term
observational studies of stellar activity, and their long-term variability is
generally not known. In this work, we study the long-term activity of two M
dwarf stars: Gl 229 A (M1/2) and Gl 752 A (M2.5). We employ medium resolution
echelle spectra obtained at the 2.15 m telescope at the Argentinian observatory
CASLEO between the years 2000 and 2010 and photometric observations obtained
from the ASAS database. We analyzed Ca \II K line-core fluxes and the mean V
magnitude with the Lomb-Scargle periodogram, and we obtain possible activity
cycles of 4 yr and 7 yr for Gl 229 A and Gl 752 A respectively.Comment: Accepted for publication by Astronomical Journal (AJ
Tests of Lorentz violation in muon antineutrino to electron antineutrino oscillations
A recently developed Standard-Model Extension (SME) formalism for neutrino
oscillations that includes Lorentz and CPT violation is used to analyze the
sidereal time variation of the neutrino event excess measured by the Liquid
Scintillator Neutrino Detector (LSND) experiment. The LSND experiment,
performed at Los Alamos National Laboratory, observed an excess, consistent
with neutrino oscillations, of in a beam of . It
is determined that the LSND oscillation signal is consistent with no sidereal
variation. However, there are several combinations of SME coefficients that
describe the LSND data; both with and without sidereal variations. The scale of
Lorentz and CPT violation extracted from the LSND data is of order
GeV for the SME coefficients and . This solution for
Lorentz and CPT violating neutrino oscillations may be tested by other short
baseline neutrino oscillation experiments, such as the MiniBooNE experiment.Comment: 10 pages, 10 figures, 2 tables, uses revtex4 replaced with version to
be published in Physical Review D, 11 pages, 11 figures, 2 tables, uses
revtex
New methods of evaluation of the flavour composition in annihilation by double hemisphere tagging at LEP/SLC energies
Two new methods are proposed to extract the flavour contents of the events produced at LEP/SLC, together with the classification matrix of a tagging by hemispheres. By utilising the tagging obtained in both hemispheres, the efficiencies, backgrounds and flavour compositions are directly obtained by fitting the data. A minimal dependence on modelling and a consistent treatment of systematic errors are achieved by applying these methods. The choice of the tagging algorithm is irrelevant in the methods, provided that similar efficiencies are reached. As an example, a multivariate analysis technique combining the tracking information given by a microvertex detector has been applied to extract the Z → b overlineb branching ratio using a standard simulation of a LEP/SLC experiment
Processfolio: uniting Academic Literacies and Critical Emancipatory Action Research for practitioner-led inquiry into EAP writing assessment
This paper reports on the design and implementation of an alternative form of writing assessment on a UK English for Academic Purposes (EAP) presessional course. The assessment, termed processfolio, was a response to research inquiry into how writing assessment in a local context negated student agency and inculcated disempowering models of teaching and learning academic writing. The project merged an Academic Literacies approach to writing (Lea and Street, 1998) with a Critical Emancipatory Action Research (Carr and Kemmis, 1986) framework and a Critical Realist(Bhaskar, 1989) perspective. Data collected from the folios and interviews with students and teachers on their experiences of the processfolio found that a small scale intervention has potential for agency to be exercised within the highly constrained context of a UK EAP pre-sessional. New directions in research are proposed which can engage students and teachers to work for change in UK EAP assessment within their internal and external constraints
Detection of period variations in extrasolar transiting planet OGLE-TR-111b
Two consecutive transits of planetary companion OGLE-TR-111b were observed in
the I band. Combining these observations with data from the literature, we find
that the timing of the transits cannot be explained by a constant period, and
that the observed variations cannot be originated by the presence of a
satellite. However, a perturbing planet with the mass of the Earth in an
exterior orbit could explain the observations if the orbit of OGLE-TR-111b is
eccentric. We also show that the eccentricity needed to explain the
observations is not ruled out by the radial velocity data found in the
literature.Comment: Corrected central times, minor changes in the analysis of the data,
and text. Accepted for publication in ApJ Letter
Search for -mesic nuclei in recoil-free transfer reaction
We have studied the reaction at
recoil-free kinematics. An meson possibly produced in this reaction
would be thus almost at rest in the laboratory system and could therefore be
bound with high probability, if nuclear states exist. The decay of such
a state through the resonance would lead to a proton- pair
emitted in opposite directions. For these conditions we find some indication of
such a bound state. An upper limit of 0.5 nb is found.Comment: 3 figure
Search for charginos in e+e- interactions at sqrt(s) = 189 GeV
An update of the searches for charginos and gravitinos is presented, based on
a data sample corresponding to the 158 pb^{-1} recorded by the DELPHI detector
in 1998, at a centre-of-mass energy of 189 GeV. No evidence for a signal was
found. The lower mass limits are 4-5 GeV/c^2 higher than those obtained at a
centre-of-mass energy of 183 GeV. The (\mu,M_2) MSSM domain excluded by
combining the chargino searches with neutralino searches at the Z resonance
implies a limit on the mass of the lightest neutralino which, for a heavy
sneutrino, is constrained to be above 31.0 GeV/c^2 for tan(beta) \geq 1.Comment: 22 pages, 8 figure
Hadronization properties of b quarks compared to light quarks in e+e- -> q qbar from 183 to 200 GeV
The DELPHI detector at LEP has collected 54 pb^{-1} of data at a
centre-of-mass energy around 183 GeV during 1997, 158 pb^{-1} around 189 GeV
during 1998, and 187 pb^{-1} between 192 and 200 GeV during 1999. These data
were used to measure the average charged particle multiplicity in e+e- -> b
bbar events, _{bb}, and the difference delta_{bl} between _{bb} and the
multiplicity, _{ll}, in generic light quark (u,d,s) events: delta_{bl}(183
GeV) = 4.55 +/- 1.31 (stat) +/- 0.73 (syst) delta_{bl}(189 GeV) = 4.43 +/- 0.85
(stat) +/- 0.61 (syst) delta_{bl}(200 GeV) = 3.39 +/- 0.89 (stat) +/- 1.01
(syst). This result is consistent with QCD predictions, while it is
inconsistent with calculations assuming that the multiplicity accompanying the
decay of a heavy quark is independent of the mass of the quark itself.Comment: 13 pages, 2 figure
Search for composite and exotic fermions at LEP 2
A search for unstable heavy fermions with the DELPHI detector at LEP is
reported. Sequential and non-canonical leptons, as well as excited leptons and
quarks, are considered. The data analysed correspond to an integrated
luminosity of about 48 pb^{-1} at an e^+e^- centre-of-mass energy of 183 GeV
and about 20 pb^{-1} equally shared between the centre-of-mass energies of 172
GeV and 161 GeV. The search for pair-produced new leptons establishes 95%
confidence level mass limits in the region between 70 GeV/c^2 and 90 GeV/c^2,
depending on the channel. The search for singly produced excited leptons and
quarks establishes upper limits on the ratio of the coupling of the excited
fermio
- …