1,376 research outputs found
Low-Energy Effective Theory, Unitarity, and Non-Decoupling Behavior in a Model with Heavy Higgs-Triplet Fields
We discuss the properties of a model incorporating both a scalar electroweak
Higgs doublet and an electroweak Higgs triplet. We construct the low-energy
effective theory for the light Higgs-doublet in the limit of small (but
nonzero) deviations in the rho parameter from one, a limit in which the triplet
states become heavy. For small deviations in the rho parameter from one,
perturbative unitarity of WW scattering breaks down at a scale inversely
proportional to the renormalized vacuum expectation value of the triplet field
(or, equivalently, inversely proportional to the square-root of the deviation
of the rho parameter from one). This result imposes an upper limit on the
mass-scale of the heavy triplet bosons in a perturbative theory; we show that
this upper bound is consistent with dimensional analysis in the low-energy
effective theory. Recent articles have shown that the triplet bosons do not
decouple, in the sense that deviations in the rho parameter from one do not
necessarily vanish at one-loop in the limit of large triplet mass. We clarify
that, despite the non-decoupling behavior of the Higgs-triplet, this model does
not violate the decoupling theorem since it incorporates a large dimensionful
coupling. Nonetheless, we show that if the triplet-Higgs boson masses are of
order the GUT scale, perturbative consistency of the theory requires the
(properly renormalized) Higgs-triplet vacuum expectation value to be so small
as to be irrelevant for electroweak phenomenology.Comment: Revtex, 11 pages, 7 eps figures included; references updated and
three footnotes adde
Dropping rho and A_1 Meson Masses at Chiral Phase Transition in the Generalized Hidden Local Symmetry
We study the chiral symmetry restoration using the generalized hidden local
symmetry (GHLS) which incorporates the rho and A_1 mesons as the gauge bosons
of the GHLS and the pion as the Nambu-Goldstone boson consistently with the
chiral symmetry of QCD. We show that a set of parameter relations, which
ensures the first and second Weinberg's sum rules, is invariant under the
renormalization group evolution. Then, we found that the Weinberg's sum rules
together with the matching of the vector and axial-vector current correlators
inevitably leads to {\it the dropping masses of both rho and A_1 mesons} at the
symmetry restoration point, and that the mass ratio as well as the mixing angle
between the pion and A_1 meson flows into one of three fixed points.Comment: 17 pages, 7 figures; references added and discussions expande
Leading quantum gravitational corrections to QED
We consider the leading post-Newtonian and quantum corrections to the
non-relativistic scattering amplitude of charged spin-1/2 fermions in the
combined theory of general relativity and QED. The coupled Dirac-Einstein
system is treated as an effective field theory. This allows for a consistent
quantization of the gravitational field. The appropriate vertex rules are
extracted from the action, and the non-analytic contributions to the 1-loop
scattering matrix are calculated in the non-relativistic limit. The
non-analytical parts of the scattering amplitude are known to give the long
range, low energy, leading quantum corrections, are used to construct the
leading post-Newtonian and quantum corrections to the two-particle
non-relativistic scattering matrix potential for two massive fermions with
electric charge.Comment: 14 pages, 29 figures, format RevTex
Fifteen years of NESDA Neuroimaging:An overview of results related to clinical profile and bio-social risk factors of major depressive disorder and common anxiety disorders
The longitudinal Netherlands Study of Depression and Anxiety (NESDA) Neuroimaging study was set up in 2003 to investigate whether neuroanatomical and functional abnormalities during tasks of primary emotional processing, executive planning and memory formation, and intrinsic brain connectivity are i) shared by individuals with major depressive disorder (MDD) and common anxiety disorders; and ii) characterized by symptomatologyspecific abnormalities. Furthermore, questions related to individual variations in vulnerability for onset, comorbidity, and longitudinal course could be investigated.& nbsp; Between 2005 and 2007, 233 individuals fulfilling a diagnosis of MDD, panic disorder, social anxiety disorder and/or generalized anxiety disorder and 68 healthy controls aging between 18 and 57 were invited from the NESDA main sample (n = 2981). An emotional faces processing task, an emotional word-encoding task, and an executive planning task were administered during 3T BOLD-fMRI acquisitions. In addition, resting state BOLDfMRI was acquired and T1-weighted structural imaging was performed. All participants were invited to participate in the two-year and nine-year follow-up MRI measurement.& nbsp; Fifteen years of NESDA Neuroimaging demonstrated common morphological and neurocognitive abnormalities across individuals with depression and anxiety disorders. It however provided limited support for the idea of more extensive abnormalities in patients suffering from both depression and anxiety, despite their worse prognosis. Risk factors including childhood maltreatment and specific risk genes had an emotion processing modulating effect, apparently stronger than effects of diagnostic labels. Furthermore, brain imaging data, especially during emotion processing seemed valuable for predicting the long-term course of affective disorders, outperforming prediction based on clinical information alone
Non locality and causal evolution in QFT
Non locality appearing in QFT during the free evolution of localized field
states and in the Feynman propagator function is analyzed. It is shown to be
connected to the initial non local properties present at the level of quantum
states and then it does not imply a violation of Einstein's causality. Then it
is investigated a simple QFT system with interaction, consisting of a classical
source coupled linearly to a quantum scalar field, that is exactly solved. The
expression for the time evolution of the state describing the system is given.
The expectation value of any arbitrary ``good'' local observable, expressed as
a function of the field operator and its space and time derivatives, is
obtained explicitly at all order in the field-matter coupling constant. These
expectation values have a source dependent part that is shown to be always
causally retarded, while the non local contributions are source independent and
related to the non local properties of zero point vacuum fluctuations.Comment: Submitted to Journal of Physics B: 16 pages: 1 figur
Regularization Methods in Chiral Perturbation Theory
Chiral lagrangians describing the interactions of Goldstone bosons in a
theory possessing spontaneous symmetry breaking are effective,
non-renormalizable field theories in four dimensions. Yet, in a momentum
expansion one is able to extract definite, testable predictions from
perturbation theory. These techniques have yielded in recent years a wealth of
information on many problems where the physics of Goldstone bosons plays a
crucial role, but theoretical issues concerning chiral perturbation theory
remain, to this date, poorly treated in the literature. We present here a
rather comprehensive analysis of the regularization and renormalization
ambiguities appearing in chiral perturbation theory at the one loop level. We
discuss first on the relevance of dealing with tadpoles properly. We
demonstrate that Ward identities severely constrain the choice of regulators to
the point of enforcing unique, unambiguous results in chiral perturbation
theory at the one-loop level for any observable which is renormalization-group
invariant. We comment on the physical implications of these results and on
several possible regulating methods that may be of use for some applications.Comment: 37 pages, 5 figs. not included (available upon request), LaTeX,
PREPRINT UB-ECM-PF 93/1
Unitarity and Bounds on the Scale of Fermion Mass Generation
The scale of fermion mass generation can, as shown by Appelquist and
Chanowitz, be bounded from above by relating it to the scale of unitarity
violation in the helicity nonconserving amplitude for fermion-anti-fermion
pairs to scatter into pairs of longitudinally polarized electroweak gauge
bosons. In this paper, we examine the process t tbar -> W_L W_L in a family of
phenomenologically-viable deconstructed Higgsless models and we show that scale
of unitarity violation depends on the mass of the additional vector-like
fermion states that occur in these theories (the states that are the
deconstructed analogs of Kaluza-Klein partners of the ordinary fermions in a
five-dimensional theory). For sufficiently light vector fermions, and for a
deconstructed theory with sufficiently many lattice sites (that is,
sufficiently close to the continuum limit), the Appelquist-Chanowitz bound can
be substantially weakened. More precisely, we find that, as one varies the mass
of the vector-like fermion for fixed top-quark and gauge-boson masses, the
bound on the scale of top-quark mass generation interpolates smoothly between
the Appelquist-Chanowitz bound and one that can, potentially, be much higher.
In these theories, therefore, the bound on the scale of fermion mass generation
is independent of the bound on the scale of gauge-boson mass generation. While
our analysis focuses on deconstructed Higgsless models, any theory in which
top-quark mass generation proceeds via the mixing of chiral and vector fermions
will give similar results.Comment: 12 pages, 11 eps figures included, revtex. Refrences added; wording
modified slightly to emphasize focus on top-quar
Vacuum energy: quantum hydrodynamics vs quantum gravity
We compare quantum hydrodynamics and quantum gravity. They share many common
features. In particular, both have quadratic divergences, and both lead to the
problem of the vacuum energy, which in the quantum gravity transforms to the
cosmological constant problem. We show that in quantum liquids the vacuum
energy density is not determined by the quantum zero-point energy of the phonon
modes. The energy density of the vacuum is much smaller and is determined by
the classical macroscopic parameters of the liquid including the radius of the
liquid droplet. In the same manner the cosmological constant is not determined
by the zero-point energy of quantum fields. It is much smaller and is
determined by the classical macroscopic parameters of the Universe dynamics:
the Hubble radius, the Newton constant and the energy density of matter. The
same may hold for the Higgs mass problem: the quadratically divergent quantum
correction to the Higgs potential mass term is also cancelled by the
microscopic (trans-Planckian) degrees of freedom due to thermodynamic stability
of the whole quantum vacuum.Comment: 14 pages, no figures, added section on the problem of Higgs mass,
version accepted for the special issue of JETP Letter
Gauge dependence of on-shell and pole mass renormalization prescriptions
We discuss the gauge dependence of physical parameter's definitions under the
on-shell and pole mass renormalization prescriptions. By two-loop-level
calculations we prove for the first time that the on-shell mass renormalization
prescription makes physical result gauge dependent. On the other hand, such
gauge dependence doesn't appear in the result of the pole mass renormalization
prescription. Our calculation also implies the difference of the physical
results between the two mass renormalization prescriptions cannot be neglected
at two-loop level.Comment: 28 pages, 15 figure
Trust and the city: Linking urban upbringing to neural mechanisms of trust in psychosis
Objective: Elevated prevalence of non-affective psychotic disorders is often found in densely populated areas. This functional magnetic resonance imaging study investigates if reduced trust, a component of impaired social functioning in patients with psychotic disorder, is associated with urban upbringing.
Methods: In total, 39 patients (22 first episode and 17 clinical high risk) and 30 healthy controls, aged 16–29, performed two multi-round trust games, with a cooperative and unfair partner during functional magnetic resonance imaging scan-ning. Baseline trust was operationalized as the first investment made, and changes of trust as changes in investments made over the 20 trials during the games. Urban exposure during upbringing (0–15 years) was defined as higher urban (≥2500 inhabitants/km2) or lower urban (<2500 inhabitants/km2).
Results: Patients displayed lower baseline trust (first investment) than controls, regardless of urbanicity exposure. During cooperative interactions, lower-urban patients showed increasing investments. In addition, during cooperative interactions, group-by-developmental urbanicity interactions were found in the right and left amygdalae, although for the latter only at trend level. Higher urbanicity was associated with decreased activation of the left amygdala in patients and controls during investments and with increased activation of the right and left amygdalae in patients only, during repayments. During unfair interactions, no associations of urbanicity with behavior or brain activation were found.
Conclusion: Urban upbringing was unrelated to baseline trust. Associations with urbanicity were stronger for patients compared to controls, suggesting greater susceptibility to urbanicity effects during the developmental period. Higher-urban patients failed to compensate for the initial distrust specifically during repeated cooperative interactions. This finding highlights potential implications for social functioning. Urban upbringing was linked to dif-ferential amygdala activation, suggesting altered mechanisms of feedback learning, but this was not associated with trust game behavio
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