scholarly journals Leading logs in QCD axion effective field theory

2021 ◽  
Vol 2021 (7) ◽  
Author(s):  
Gonzalo Alonso-Álvarez ◽  
Fatih Ertas ◽  
Joerg Jaeckel ◽  
Felix Kahlhoefer ◽  
Lennert J. Thormaehlen

Abstract The axion is much lighter than all other degrees of freedom introduced by the Peccei-Quinn mechanism to solve the strong CP problem. It is therefore natural to use an effective field theory (EFT) to describe its interactions. Loop processes calculated in the EFT may however explicitly depend on the ultraviolet cutoff. In general, the UV cutoff is not uniquely defined, but the dimensionful couplings suggest to identify it with the Peccei-Quinn symmetry-breaking scale. An example are K+ → π+ + a decays that will soon be tested to improved precision in NA62 and KOTO and whose amplitude is dominated by the term logarithmically dependent on the cutoff. In this paper, we critically examine the adequacy of using such a naive EFT approach to study loop processes by comparing EFT calculations with ones performed in complete QCD axion models. In DFSZ models, for example, the cutoff is found to be set by additional Higgs degrees of freedom and to therefore be much closer to the electroweak scale than to the Peccei-Quinn scale. In fact, there are non-trivial requirements on axion models where the cutoff scale of loop processes is close to the Peccei-Quinn scale, such that the naive EFT result is reproduced. This suggests that the existence of a suitable UV embedding may impose restrictions on axion EFTs. We provide an explicit construction of a model with suitable fermion couplings and find promising prospects for NA62 and IAXO.

2020 ◽  
Vol 2020 (11) ◽  
Author(s):  
Yi Liao ◽  
Xiao-Dong Ma

Abstract We investigate systematically dimension-9 operators in the standard model effective field theory which contains only standard model fields and respects its gauge symmetry. With the help of the Hilbert series approach to classifying operators according to their lepton and baryon numbers and their field contents, we construct the basis of operators explicitly. We remove redundant operators by employing various kinematic and algebraic relations including integration by parts, equations of motion, Schouten identities, Dirac matrix and Fierz identities, and Bianchi identities. We confirm counting of independent operators by analyzing their flavor symmetry relations. All operators violate lepton or baryon number or both, and are thus non-Hermitian. Including Hermitian conjugated operators there are $$ {\left.384\right|}_{\Delta B=0}^{\Delta L=\pm 2}+{\left.10\right|}_{\Delta B=\pm 2}^{\Delta L=0}+{\left.4\right|}_{\Delta B=\pm 1}^{\Delta L=\pm 3}+{\left.236\right|}_{\Delta B=\pm 1}^{\Delta L=\mp 1} $$ 384 Δ B = 0 Δ L = ± 2 + 10 Δ B = ± 2 Δ L = 0 + 4 Δ B = ± 1 Δ L = ± 3 + 236 Δ B = ± 1 Δ L = ∓ 1 operators without referring to fermion generations, and $$ {\left.44874\right|}_{\Delta B=0}^{\Delta L=\pm 2}+{\left.2862\right|}_{\Delta B=\pm 2}^{\Delta L=0}+{\left.486\right|}_{\Delta B=\pm 1}^{\Delta L=\pm 3}+{\left.42234\right|}_{\Delta B=\mp 1}^{\Delta L=\pm 1} $$ 44874 Δ B = 0 Δ L = ± 2 + 2862 Δ B = ± 2 Δ L = 0 + 486 Δ B = ± 1 Δ L = ± 3 + 42234 Δ B = ∓ 1 Δ L = ± 1 operators when three generations of fermions are referred to, where ∆L, ∆B denote the net lepton and baryon numbers of the operators. Our result provides a starting point for consistent phenomenological studies associated with dimension-9 operators.


2020 ◽  
Vol 2020 (10) ◽  
Author(s):  
Tong Li ◽  
Xiao-Dong Ma ◽  
Michael A. Schmidt

Abstract In this work we investigate the implication of low-energy precision measurements on the quark-lepton charged currents in general neutrino interactions with sterile neutrinos in effective field theories. The physics in low-energy measurements is described by the low-energy effective field theory extended with sterile neutrinos (LNEFT) defined below the electroweak scale. We also take into account renormalization group running and match the LNEFT onto the Standard Model (SM) effective field theory with sterile neutrinos (SMNEFT) to constrain new physics (NP) above the electroweak scale. The most sensitive low-energy probes are from leptonic decays of pseudoscalar mesons and hadronic tau lepton decays in terms of precise decay branching fractions, the lepton flavor universality and the Cabibbo-Kobayashi-Maskawa (CKM) unitarity. We also consider other constraints including nuclear beta decay. The constraints on charged current operators are generally stronger than the ones for quark-neutrino neutral current operators. We find that the most stringent bounds on the NP scale of lepton-number-conserving and lepton- number-violating operators in SMNEFT are 74 (110) TeV and 9.8 (13) TeV, respectively, for the operators with down (strange) quark.


2009 ◽  
Vol 24 (11n13) ◽  
pp. 921-930
Author(s):  
HERMANN KREBS

Using chiral effective field theory (EFT) with explicit Δ degrees of freedom we calculated nuclear forces up to next-to-next-to-leading order (N2LO). We find a much improved convergence of the chiral expansion in all peripheral partial waves. We also present a novel lattice EFT method developed for systems with larger number of nucleons. Combining Monte Carlo lattice simulations with EFT allows one to calculate the properties of light nuclei, neutron and nuclear matter. Accurate description of two-nucleon phase-shifts and ground state energy ratio of dilute neutron matter up to corrections of higher orders show that lattice EFT is a promising tool for quantitative studies of low-energy few- and many-body systems.


Author(s):  
Nicolás Valdés-Meller

We argue that quantum gravity is nonlocal, first by recalling well-known arguments that support this idea and then by focusing on a point not usually emphasized: that making a conventional effective field theory (EFT) for quantum gravity is particularly difficult, and perhaps impossible in principle. This inability to realize an EFT comes down to the fact that gravity itself sets length scales for a problem: when integrating out degrees of freedom above some cutoff, the effective metric one uses will be different, which will itself re-define the cutoff. We also point out that even if the previous problem is fixed, naïvely applying EFT in gravity can lead to problems — we give a particular example in the case of black holes.


2014 ◽  
Vol 23 (12) ◽  
pp. 1442012 ◽  
Author(s):  
Justin Khoury ◽  
Godfrey E. J. Miller ◽  
Andrew J. Tolley

Traditional derivations of general relativity (GR) from the graviton degrees of freedom assume spacetime Lorentz covariance as an axiom. In this paper, we survey recent evidence that GR is the unique spatially-covariant effective field theory of the transverse, traceless graviton degrees of freedom. The Lorentz covariance of GR, having not been assumed in our analysis, is thus plausibly interpreted as an accidental or emergent symmetry of the gravitational sector. From this point of view, Lorentz covariance is a necessary feature of low-energy graviton dynamics, not a property of spacetime. This result has revolutionary implications for fundamental physics.


2006 ◽  
Vol 21 (17) ◽  
pp. 3441-3472 ◽  
Author(s):  
JASON KUMAR

We review some basic flux vacua counting techniques and results, focusing on the distributions of properties over different regions of the landscape of string vacua and assessing the phenomenological implications. The topics we discuss include: an overview of how moduli are stabilized and how vacua are counted; the applicability of effective field theory; the uses of and differences between probabilistic and statistical analysis (and the relation to the anthropic principle); the distribution of various parameters on the landscape, including cosmological constant, gauge group rank, and supersymmetry-breaking scale; "friendly landscapes;" open string moduli; the (in)finiteness of the number of phenomenologically viable vacua; etc. At all points, we attempt to connect this study to the phenomenology of vacua which are experimentally viable.


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