Complete High Temperature Expansions for One-Loop Finite Temperature Effects

We develop exact, simple closed form expressions for partition functions associated with relativistic bosons and fermions in odd spatial dimensions. These expressions, valid at high temperature, include the effects of a non-trivial Polyakov loop and generalize well-known high temperature expansions. The key technical point is the proof of a set of Bessel function identities which resum low temperature expansions into high temperature expansions. The complete expressions for these partition functions can be used to obtain one-loop finite temperature contributions to effective potentials, and thus free energies and pressures.Comment: 9 pages, RevTeX, no figures. To be published in Phys. Rev D. v2 has revised introduction and conclusions, plus a few typographical errors are corrected; v3 corrects one typ

Zero gravity and cardiovascular homeostasis. The relationship between endogenous hyperprolactinemia and plasma aldosterone

Prolactin, thyrotropin and aldosterone were measured by radioimmunoassay and plasma renin activity by the radioimmunoassay of angiotensin I in normal women before and after the intravenous injection of 200 micrograms of thyrotropin releasing hormone. Prolactin increased at 15 minutes following thyrotropin releasing hormone. Plasma renin activity was not different from control levels during the first hour following the administration of thyrotropin releasing hormone, nor did the plasma aldosterone concentration differ significantly from the control levels during this period. However, with upright posture, an increase in aldosterone and in plasma renin activity was noted, demonstrating a normal capacity to secrete aldosterone. Similarly, no change in aldosterone was seen in 9 patients with primary hypothyroidism given thyrotropin releasing hormone, despite the fact that the increase in prolactin was greater than normal. These data demonstrate that acutely or chronically elevated serum prolactin levels do not result in increased plasma aldosterone levels in humans

Relativistic Quantum Thermodynamics of Ideal Gases in 2 Dimensions

In this work we study the behavior of relativistic ideal Bose and Fermi gases in two space dimensions. Making use of polylogarithm functions we derive a closed and unified expression for their densities. It is shown that both type of gases are essentially inequivalent, and only in the non-relativistic limit the spinless and equal mass Bose and Fermi gases are equivalent as known in the literature.Comment: 6 pages, 1 figur

Sneutrino Mixing Phenomena

In any model with nonzero Majorana neutrino masses, the sneutrino and antisneutrino of the supersymmetric extended theory mix. We outline the conditions under which sneutrino-antisneutrino mixing is experimentally observable. The mass-splitting of the sneutrino mass eigenstates and sneutrino oscillation phenomena are considered.Comment: 12 pages, revtex + axodraw, 1 figure included. Minor change

Conditions for CP-Violation in the General Two-Higgs-Doublet Model

The most general Higgs potential of the two-Higgs-doublet model (2HDM) contains three squared-mass parameters and seven quartic self-coupling parameters. Among these, one squared-mass parameter and three quartic coupling parameters are potentially complex. The Higgs potential explicitly violates CP symmetry if and only if no choice of basis exists in the two-dimensional Higgs ``flavor'' space in which all the Higgs potential parameters are real. We exhibit four independent potentially complex invariant (basis-independent) combinations of mass and coupling parameters and show that the reality of all four invariants provides the necessary and sufficient conditions for an explicitly CP-conserving 2HDM scalar potential. Additional potentially complex invariants can be constructed that depend on the Higgs field vacuum expectation values (vevs). We demonstrate how these can be used together with the vev-independent invariants to distinguish between explicit and spontaneous CP-violation in the Higgs sector.Comment: 46 pages, minor typographical errors corrected, accepted for publication in Phys. Rev.

Frontostriatal Maturation Predicts Cognitive Control Failure to Appetitive Cues in Adolescents

Adolescent risk-taking is a public health issue that increases the odds of poor lifetime outcomes. One factor thought to influence adolescents' propensity for risk-taking is an enhanced sensitivity to appetitive cues, relative to an immature capacity to exert sufficient cognitive control. We tested this hypothesis by characterizing interactions among ventral striatal, dorsal striatal, and prefrontal cortical regions with varying appetitive load using fMRI scanning. Child, teen, and adult participants performed a go/no-go task with appetitive (happy faces) and neutral cues (calm faces). Impulse control to neutral cues showed linear improvement with age, whereas teens showed a nonlinear reduction in impulse control to appetitive cues. This performance decrement in teens was paralleled by enhanced activity in the ventral striatum. Prefrontal cortical recruitment correlated with overall accuracy and showed a linear response with age for no-go versus go trials. Connectivity analyses identified a ventral frontostriatal circuit including the inferior frontal gyrus and dorsal striatum during no-go versus go trials. Examining recruitment developmentally showed that teens had greater between-subject ventral-dorsal striatal coactivation relative to children and adults for happy no-go versus go trials. These findings implicate exaggerated ventral striatal representation of appetitive cues in adolescents relative to an intermediary cognitive control response. Connectivity and coactivity data suggest these systems communicate at the level of the dorsal striatum differentially across development. Biased responding in this system is one possible mechanism underlying heightened risk-taking during adolescence

Electroweak Symmetry Breaking and BSM Physics (A Review)

In this talk, I shall first discuss the standard model Higgs mechanism and then highlight some of its deficiencies making a case for the need to go beyond the standard model (BSM). The BSM tour will be guided by symmetry arguments. I shall pick up four specific BSM scenarios, namely, supersymmetry, Little Higgs, Gauge-Higgs unification, and the Higgsless approach. The discussion will be confined mainly on their electroweak symmetry breaking aspects.Comment: 17 pages, 10 eps figs, Based on plenary talks at the International Conferences: WIN07, Kolkata, Jan'07, and WHEPP-10, Chennai, Jan'08. To appear in the WHEPP-10 proceedings (a special issue of PRAMANA

Calculable Upper Limit on the Mass of the Lightest Higgs Boson in Any Perturbatively Valid Supersymmetric Theory

We show that there is a calculable upper limit on the mass of the lightest Higgs boson in any supersymmetric theory that remains perturbative up to a high scale . There are no restrictions on the Higgs sector, or the gauge group or particle content. We estimate the value of the upper limit to be m_{\hcirc} < 146 GeV for 100 GeV < $M_t$ < 145 GeV, from all effects except possibly additional heavy fermions beyond top (which could increase the limit by 0-20 GeV if any existed); for $M_t$ > 145 GeV the limit decreases monotonically. We expect to be able to decrease the value of the upper limit by at least a few percent by very careful analysis of the conditions. It is not normal in models for the actual mass to saturate the upper limit.Comment: 8 pages, UM-TH-92-24, Plain TeX. (One table available by fax on request to [email protected]

Radiative Neutralino Decay in Split Supersymmetry

Radiative neutralino decay $\chi^0_2 -> \chi^0_1\gamma$ is studied in a Split Supersymmetric scenario, and compared with mSUGRA and MSSM. This 1-loop process has a transition amplitude which is often quite small, but has the advantage of providing a very clear and distinct signature: electromagnetic radiation plus missing energy. In Split Supersymmetry this radiative decay is in direct competition with the tree-level three-body decay $\chi^0_2 -> \chi^0_1 f\overline f$, and we obtain large values for the branching ratio $B(\chi^0_2 -> \chi^0_1\gamma)$ which can be close to unity in the region $M_2 \sim M_1$. Furthermore, the value for the radiative neutralino decay branching ratio has a strong dependence on the split supersymmetric scale $\widetilde{m}$, which is otherwise very difficult to infer from experimental observables.Comment: 15 pages and 10 figure