Rigorous Approach to the Gravitational Lensing

We revisit a weak gravitational lensing problem by constructing a setup which describes the actual system as accurately as possible and solving the null geodesic equations. Details are given for the case of a Universe driven only by a cosmological constant, \Lambda, which confirm the conventional results: The conventional lensing analysis is correct as it is, without any need for correction of O(\Lambda). We also treat the cases of the lensing in generic FRW backgrounds.Comment: 6 pages, the discussion is revise

Genus Topology of the Cosmic Microwave Background from the WMAP 3-Year Data

We have independently measured the genus topology of the temperature fluctuations in the cosmic microwave background seen in the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) 3-year data. A genus analysis of the WMAP data indicates consistency with Gaussian random-phase initial conditions, as predicted by standard inflation. We set 95% confidence limits on non-linearities of -101 < f_{nl} < 107. We also find that the observed low l (l <= 8) modes show a slight anti-correlation with the Galactic foreground, but not exceeding 95% confidence, and that the topology defined by these modes is consistent with that of a Gaussian random-phase distribution (within 95% confidence).Comment: MNRAS LaTeX style (mn2e.cls), EPS and JPEG figure

Planetary companions orbiting M giants HD 208527 and HD 220074

Aims. The purpose of the present study is to research the origin of planetary companions by using a precise radial velocity (RV) survey. Methods. The high-resolution spectroscopy of the fiber-fed Bohyunsan Observatory Echelle Spectrograph (BOES) at Bohyunsan Optical Astronomy Observatory (BOAO) is used from September 2008 to June 2012. Results. We report the detection of two exoplanets in orbit around HD 208527 and HD 220074 exhibiting periodic variations in RV of 875.5 +/- 5.8 and 672.1 +/- 3.7 days. The RV variations are not apparently related to the surface inhomogeneities and a Keplerian motion of the planetary companion is the most likely explanation. Assuming possible stellar masses of 1.6 +/- 0.4 and 1.2 +/- 0.3 M_Sun, we obtain the minimum masses for the exoplanets of 9.9 +/- 1.7 and 11.1 +/- 1.8 M_Jup around HD 208527 and HD 220074 with an orbital semi-major axis of 2.1 +/- 0.2 and 1.6 +/- 0.1 AU and an eccentricity of 0.08 and 0.14, respectively. We also find that the previously known spectral classification of HD 208527 and HD 220074 was in error: Our new estimation of stellar parameters suggest that both HD 208527 and HD 220074 are M giants. Therefore, HD 208527 and HD 220074 are so far the first candidate M giants to harbor a planetary companion.Comment: 7 pages, 9 figures, 4 tables, accepted for publisation in Astronomy & Astrophysic

Possible Suppression of Resonant Signals for Split-UED by Mixing at the LHC?

The mixing of the imaginary parts of the transition amplitudes of nearby resonances via the breakdown of the Breit-Wigner approximation has been shown to lead to potentially large modifications in the signal rates for new physics at colliders. In the case of suppression, this effect may be significant enough to lead to some new physics signatures being initially missed in searches at, e.g., the LHC. Here we explore the influence of this `width mixing' on the production of the nearly degenerate, level-2 Kaluza-Klein (KK) neutral gauge bosons present in Split-UED. We demonstrate that in this particular case large cross section modifications in the resonance region are necessarily absent and explain why this is so based on the group theoretical structure of the SM.Comment: 10 pages, 2 figures; discussion and references adde

Isospin-violating dark matter from a double portal

We study a simple model that can give rise to isospin-violating interactions of Dirac fermion asymmetric dark matter to protons and neutrons through the interference of a scalar and U(1)$'$ gauge boson contribution. The model can yield a large suppression of the elastic scattering cross section off Xenon relative to Silicon thus reconciling CDMS-Si and LUX results while being compatible with LHC findings on the 126 GeV Higgs, electroweak precision tests and flavour constraints.Comment: 25 pages, 7 figure

Monte Carlo simulations of bosonic reaction-diffusion systems

An efficient Monte Carlo simulation method for bosonic reaction-diffusion systems which are mainly used in the renormalization group (RG) study is proposed. Using this method, one dimensional bosonic single species annihilation model is studied and, in turn, the results are compared with RG calculations. The numerical data are consistent with RG predictions. As a second application, a bosonic variant of the pair contact process with diffusion (PCPD) is simulated and shown to share the critical behavior with the PCPD. The invariance under the Galilean transformation of this boson model is also checked and discussion about the invariance in conjunction with other models are in order.Comment: Publishe