190 research outputs found
Vacuum energy and spectral function sum rules
We reformulate the problem of the cancellation of the ultraviolet
divergencies of the vacuum energy, particularly important at the cosmological
level, in terms of a saturation of spectral function sum rules which leads to a
set of conditions on the spectrum of the fundamental theory. We specialize the
approach to both Minkowski and de Sitter space-times and investigate some
examples.Comment: 11 pages, revtex4, no figures, version to be published on PR
Quantum Gravity Effects in Black Holes at the LHC
We study possible back-reaction and quantum gravity effects in the
evaporation of black holes which could be produced at the LHC through a
modification of the Hawking emission. The corrections are phenomenologically
taken into account by employing a modified relation between the black hole mass
and temperature. The usual assumption that black holes explode around TeV
is also released, and the evaporation process is extended to (possibly much)
smaller final masses. We show that these effects could be observable for black
holes produced with a relatively large mass and should therefore be taken into
account when simulating micro-black hole events for the experiments planned at
the LHC.Comment: 14 pages, 8 figures, extended version of hep-ph/0601243 with new
analysis of final products, final version accepted for publication in J.
Phys.
Black hole evaporation in a spherically symmetric non-commutative space-time
Recent work in the literature has studied the quantum-mechanical decay of a
Schwarzschild-like black hole, formed by gravitational collapse, into
almost-flat space-time and weak radiation at a very late time. The relevant
quantum amplitudes have been evaluated for bosonic and fermionic fields,
showing that no information is lost in collapse to a black hole. On the other
hand, recent developments in noncommutative geometry have shown that, in
general relativity, the effects of non-commutativity can be taken into account
by keeping the standard form of the Einstein tensor on the left-hand side of
the field equations and introducing a modified energy-momentum tensor as a
source on the right-hand side. Relying on the recently obtained
non-commutativity effect on a static, spherically symmetric metric, we have
considered from a new perspective the quantum amplitudes in black hole
evaporation. The general relativity analysis of spin-2 amplitudes has been
shown to be modified by a multiplicative factor F depending on a constant
non-commutativity parameter and on the upper limit R of the radial coordinate.
Limiting forms of F have been derived which are compatible with the adiabatic
approximation.Comment: 8 pages, Latex file with IOP macros, prepared for the QFEXT07
Conference, Leipzig, September 200
Gravitational amplitudes in black-hole evaporation: the effect of non-commutative geometry
Recent work in the literature has studied the quantum-mechanical decay of a
Schwarzschild-like black hole, formed by gravitational collapse, into
almost-flat space-time and weak radiation at a very late time. The relevant
quantum amplitudes have been evaluated for bosonic and fermionic fields,
showing that no information is lost in collapse to a black hole. On the other
hand, recent developments in noncommutative geometry have shown that, in
general relativity, the effects of noncommutativity can be taken into account
by keeping the standard form of the Einstein tensor on the left-hand side of
the field equations and introducing a modified energy-momentum tensor as a
source on the right-hand side. The present paper, relying on the recently
obtained noncommutativity effect on a static, spherically symmetric metric,
considers from a new perspective the quantum amplitudes in black hole
evaporation. The general relativity analysis of spin-2 amplitudes is shown to
be modified by a multiplicative factor F depending on a constant
non-commutativity parameter and on the upper limit R of the radial coordinate.
Limiting forms of F are derived which are compatible with the adiabatic
approximation here exploited. Approximate formulae for the particle emission
rate are also obtained within this framework.Comment: 14 pages, 2 figures, Latex macros. In the final version, section 5
has been amended, the presentation has been improved, and References 21-24
have been added. Last misprints amended in Section 5 and Ref. 2
Energy-Momentum Tensor of Cosmological Fluctuations during Inflation
We study the renormalized energy-momentum tensor (EMT) of cosmological scalar
fluctuations during the slow-rollover regime for chaotic inflation with a
quadratic potential and find that it is characterized by a negative energy
density which grows during slow-rollover. We also approach the back-reaction
problem as a second-order calculation in perturbation theory finding no
evidence that the back-reaction of cosmological fluctuations is a gauge
artifact. In agreement with the results on the EMT, the average expansion rate
is decreased by the back-reaction of cosmological fluctuations.Comment: 19 pages, no figures.An appendix and references added, conclusions
unchanged, version accepted for publication in PR
Mini Black Holes in the first year of the LHC
The experimental signatures of TeV-mass black hole (BH) formation in heavy
ion collisions at the LHC is examined. We find that the black hole production
results in a complete disappearance of all very high ({} GeV)
back-to-back correlated di-jets of total mass {}TeV. We show
that the subsequent Hawking-decay produces multiple hard mono-jets and discuss
their detection. We study the possibility of cold black hole remnant (BHR)
formation of mass and the experimental distinguishability of
scenarios with BHRs and those with complete black hole decay. Due to the rather
moderate luminosity in the first year of LHC running the least chance for the
observation of BHs or BHRs at this early stage will be by ionizing tracks in
the ALICE TPC. Finally we point out that stable BHRs would be interesting
candidates for energy production by conversion of mass to Hawking radiation.Comment: 10 pages, 2 figure
Gamma-ray flaring activity from the gravitationally lensed blazar PKS 1830-211 observed by Fermi LAT
The Large Area Telescope (LAT) on board the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope
routinely detects the highly dust-absorbed, reddened, and MeV-peaked flat
spectrum radio quasar PKS 1830-211 (z=2.507). Its apparent isotropic gamma-ray
luminosity (E>100 MeV) averaged over 3 years of observations and peaking
on 2010 October 14/15 at 2.9 X 10^{50} erg s^{-1}, makes it among the brightest
high-redshift Fermi blazars. No published model with a single lens can account
for all of the observed characteristics of this complex system. Based on radio
observations, one expects time delayed variability to follow about 25 days
after a primary flare, with flux about a factor 1.5 less. Two large gamma-ray
flares of PKS 1830-211 have been detected by the LAT in the considered period
and no substantial evidence for such a delayed activity was found. This allows
us to place a lower limit of about 6 on the gamma rays flux ratio between the
two lensed images. Swift XRT observations from a dedicated Target of
Opportunity program indicate a hard spectrum and with no significant
correlation of X-ray flux with the gamma-ray variability. The spectral energy
distribution can be modeled with inverse Compton scattering of thermal photons
from the dusty torus. The implications of the LAT data in terms of variability,
the lack of evident delayed flare events, and different radio and gamma-ray
flux ratios are discussed. Microlensing effects, absorption, size and location
of the emitting regions, the complex mass distribution of the system, an
energy-dependent inner structure of the source, and flux suppression by the
lens galaxy for one image path may be considered as hypotheses for
understanding our results.Comment: 14 pages, 6 figures, 2 tables. Accepted by the The Astrophysical
Journal. Corresponding authors: S. Ciprini (ASI ASDC & INAF OAR, Rome,
Italy), S. Buson (INAF Padova & Univ. of Padova, Padova, Italy), J. Finke
(NRL, Washington, DC, USA), F. D'Ammando (INAF IRA, Bologna, Italy
A Quintessentially Geometric Model
We consider string inspired cosmology on a solitary -brane moving in the
background of a ring of branes located on a circle of radius . The motion of
the -brane transverse to the plane of the ring gives rise to a radion field
which can be mapped to a massive non-BPS Born-Infeld type field with a cosh
potential. For certain bounds of the brane tension we find an inflationary
phase is possible, with the string scale relatively close to the Planck scale.
The relevant perturbations and spectral indices are all well within the
expected observational bounds. The evolution of the universe eventually comes
to be dominated by dark energy, which we show is a late time attractor of the
model. However we also find that the equation of state is time dependent, and
will lead to late time Quintessence.Comment: 11 pages, 3 figures. References and comments adde
Constraints from Solar and Reactor Neutrinos on Unparticle Long-Range Forces
We have investigated the impact of long-range forces induced by unparticle
operators of scalar, vector and tensor nature coupled to fermions in the
interpretation of solar neutrinos and KamLAND data. If the unparticle couplings
to the neutrinos are mildly non-universal, such long-range forces will not
factorize out in the neutrino flavour evolution. As a consequence large
deviations from the observed standard matter-induced oscillation pattern for
solar neutrinos would be generated. In this case, severe limits can be set on
the infrared fix point scale, Lambda_u, and the new physics scale, M, as a
function of the ultraviolet (d_UV) and anomalous (d) dimension of the
unparticle operator. For a scalar unparticle, for instance, assuming the
non-universality of the lepton couplings to unparticles to be of the order of a
few per mil we find that, for d_UV=3 and d=1.1, M is constrained to be M >
O(10^9) TeV (M > O(10^10) TeV) if Lambda_u= 1 TeV (10 TeV). For given values of
Lambda_u and d, the corresponding bounds on M for vector [tensor] unparticles
are approximately 100 [3/Sqrt(Lambda_u/TeV)] times those for the scalar case.
Conversely, these results can be translated into severe constraints on
universality violation of the fermion couplings to unparticle operators with
scales which can be accessible at future colliders.Comment: 13 pages, 3 figures. Minor changes due to precision in numerical
factors and correction in figure labels. References added. Conclusions remain
unchange
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