5,846 research outputs found
On the origin of the March 5, 1979 gamma ray transient: A vibrating neutron star in the Large Magellanic Cloud
It is proposed that a vibrating neutron star in the Large Magellanic Cloud is the source of the March 5 transient. Neutron star vibrations transport energy rapidly to the surface, heat the atmosphere by wave dissipation, and decay by gravitational radiation reaction. The electromagnetic emission arises from e(+)-e(-) pairs which cool and annihilate in the strong magnetic field of the neutron star. The field also confines the pairs, and this allows the production of the redshifted annihilation feature observed in the data. The redshift implies a gravitational radiation damping time which agrees with the 0.15 second duration of the impulsive phase of the event. Thus, the March 5 transient may be both the first detection of a vibrating neutron star and indirect evidence for gravitational radiation
Metastable dark matter mechanisms for INTEGRAL 511 keV rays and DAMA/CoGeNT events
We explore dark matter mechanisms that can simultaneously explain the
galactic 511 keV gamma rays observed by INTEGRAL/SPI, the DAMA/LIBRA annual
modulation, and the excess of low-recoil dark matter candidates observed by
CoGeNT. It requires three nearly degenerate states of dark matter in the 4-7
GeV mass range, with splittings respectively of order an MeV and a few keV. The
top two states have the small mass gap and transitions between them, either
exothermic or endothermic, can account for direct detections. Decays from one
of the top states to the ground state produce low-energy positrons in the
galaxy whose associated 511 keV gamma rays are seen by INTEGRAL. This decay can
happen spontaneously, if the excited state is metastable (longer-lived than the
age of the universe), or it can be triggered by inelastic scattering of the
metastable states into the shorter-lived ones. We focus on a simple model where
the DM is a triplet of an SU(2) hidden sector gauge symmetry, broken at the
scale of a few GeV, giving masses of order \lsim 1 GeV to the dark gauge
bosons, which mix kinetically with the standard model hypercharge. The purely
decaying scenario can give the observed angular dependence of the 511 keV
signal with no positron diffusion, while the inelastic scattering mechanism
requires transport of the positrons over distances \sim 1 kpc before
annihilating. We note that an x-ray line of several keV in energy, due to
single-photon decays involving the top DM states, could provide an additional
component to the diffuse x-ray background. The model is testable by proposed
low-energy fixed target experiments.Comment: 27 pp, 19 figures; v2. minor clarification, added refs; v3. corrected
observed rate of positron production, added new section responding to
criticisms of arXiv:0904.1025; v4. corrected typos in eqs. (6) and (40
Mimicking transPlanckian effects in the CMB with conventional physics
We investigate the possibility that fields coupled to the inflaton can
influence the primordial spectrum of density perturbations through their
coherent motion. For example, the second field in hybrid inflation might be
oscillating at the beginning of inflation rather than at the minimum of its
potential. Although this effect is washed out if inflation lasts long enough,
we note that there can be up to 30 e-foldings of inflation prior to horizon
crossing of COBE fluctuations while still giving a potentially visible
distortion. Such pumping of the inflaton fluctuations by purely conventional
physics can resemble transPlanckian effects which have been widely discussed.
The distortions which they make to the CMB could leave a distinctive signature
which differs from generic effects like tilting of the spectrum.Comment: 3 pages, 4 figures; presented at PASCOS 03, TIFR, Mumbai, Indi
Narrow-line Laser Cooling by Adiabatic Transfer
We propose and demonstrate a novel laser cooling mechanism applicable to
particles with narrow-linewidth optical transitions. By sweeping the frequency
of counter-propagating laser beams in a sawtooth manner, we cause adiabatic
transfer back and forth between the ground state and a long-lived optically
excited state. The time-ordering of these adiabatic transfers is determined by
Doppler shifts, which ensures that the associated photon recoils are in the
opposite direction to the particle's motion. This ultimately leads to a robust
cooling mechanism capable of exerting large forces via a weak transition and
with reduced reliance on spontaneous emission. We present a simple intuitive
model for the resulting frictional force, and directly demonstrate its efficacy
for increasing the total phase-space density of an atomic ensemble. We rely on
both simulation and experimental studies using the 7.5~kHz linewidth S
to P transition in Sr. The reduced reliance on spontaneous
emission may allow this adiabatic sweep method to be a useful tool for cooling
particles that lack closed cycling transitions, such as molecules.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figure
Status of Electroweak Phase Transition and Baryogenesis
I review recent progress on the electroweak phase transition and
baryogenesis, focusing on the minimal supersymmetric standard model as the
source of new physics.Comment: 10 pp, 6 figures; plenary talk given at 6th Workshop on High Energy
Physics Phenomenology, 4 Jan. 2000, Chennai, India. v.2: added reference
Leptogenesis with Left-Right domain walls
The presence of domain walls separating regions of unbroken and
is shown to provide necessary conditions for leptogenesis which
converts later to the observed Baryon aymmetry. The strength of lepton number
violation is related to the majorana neutrino mass and hence related to current
bounds on light neutrino masses. Thus the observed neutrino masses and the
Baryon asymmetry can be used to constrain the scale of Left-Right symmetry
breaking.Comment: References added, To appear in Praman
Interesting consequences of brane cosmology
We discuss cosmology in four dimensions within a context of brane-world
scenario.Such models can predict chaotic inflation with very low reheat
temperature depending on the brane tension. We notice that the gravitino
abundance is different in the brane-world cosmology and by tuning the brane
tension it is possible to get extremely low abundance. We also study
Affleck-Dine baryogenesis in our toy model.Comment: 5 pages, Trivial changes to match the published versio
Effect of the length of inflation on angular TT and TE power spectra in power-law inflation
The effect of the length of inflation on the power spectra of scalar and
tensor perturbations is estimated using the power-law inflation model with a
scale factor of a(t) = t^q. Considering various pre-inflation models with
radiation-dominated or scalar matter-dominated periods before inflation in
combination with two matching conditions, the temperature angular power
spectrum (TT) and temperature-polarization cross-power spectrum (TE) are
calculated and a likelihood analysis is performed. It is shown that the
discrepancies between the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) data and
the LCDM model, such as suppression of the spectrum at l = 2,3 and oscillatory
behavior, may be explained by the finite length of inflation model if the
length of inflation is near 60 e-folds and q > 300. The proposed models retain
similar values of chi^2 to that achieved by the LCDM model with respect to fit
to the WMAP data, but display different characteristics of the angular TE power
spectra at l < 20.Comment: 41 pages, 11 figure
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