Electroweak symmetry non-restoration from dark matter

Restoration of the electroweak symmetry at temperatures around the Higgs mass is linked to tight phenomenological constraints on many baryogenesis scenarios. A potential remedy can be found in mechanisms of electroweak symmetry non-restoration (SNR), in which symmetry breaking is extended to higher temperatures due to new states with couplings to the Standard Model. Here we show that, in the presence of a second Higgs doublet, SNR can be realized with only a handful of new fermions which can be identified as viable dark matter candidates consistent with all current observational constraints. The competing requirements on this class of models allow for SNR at temperatures up to ∼TeV, and imply the presence of sub-TeV new physics with sizable interactions with the Standard Model. As a result this scenario is highly testable with signals in reach of next-generation collider and dark matter direct detection experiments.

Dark matter and lepton flavour phenomenology in a singlet-doublet scotogenic model

We study the dark matter phenomenology of scotogenic frameworks through a rather illustrative model extending the Standard Model by scalar and fermionic singlets and doublets. Such a setup is phenomenologically attractive since it provides the radiative generation of neutrino masses, while also including viable candidates for cold dark matter. We employ a Markov Chain Monte Carlo algorithm to explore the associated parameter space in view of numerous constraints stemming from the Higgs mass, the neutrino sector, dark matter, and lepton-flavour violating processes. After a general discussion of the results, we focus on the case of fermionic dark matter, which remains rather uncovered in the literature so far. We discuss the associated phenomenology and show that in this particular case a rather specific mass spectrum is expected with fermion masses just above 1 TeV. Our study may serve as a guideline for future collider studies.

Towards a Higgs mass determination in asymptotically safe gravity with a dark portal

There are indications that an asymptotically safe UV completion of the Standard Model with gravity could constrain the Higgs self-coupling, resulting in a prediction of the Higgs mass close to the vacuum stability bound in the Standard Model. The predicted value depends on the top quark mass and comes out somewhat higher than the experimental value if the current central value for the top quark mass is assumed. Beyond the Standard Model, the predicted value also depends on dark fields coupled through a Higgs portal. Here we study the Higgs self-coupling in a toy model of the Standard Model with quantum gravity that we extend by a dark scalar and fermion. Within the approximations used in [1], there is a single free parameter in the asymptotically safe dark sector, as a function of which the predicted (toy model) Higgs mass can be lowered due to mixing effects if the dark sector undergoes spontaneous symmetry breaking.

Self-organised localisation

We describe a new phenomenon in quantum cosmology: self-organised localisation. When the fundamental parameters of a theory are functions of a scalar field subject to large fluctuations during inflation, quantum phase transitions can act as dynamical attractors. As a result, the theory parameters are probabilistically localised around the critical value and the Universe finds itself at the edge of a phase transition. We illustrate how self-organised localisation could account for the observed near-criticality of the Higgs self-coupling, the naturalness of the Higgs mass, or the smallness of the cosmological constant.

Two-loop $$ \mathcal{O} $$((αt + αλ + ακ)2) corrections to the Higgs boson masses in the CP-violating NMSSM

We present our computation of the $$ \mathcal{O} $$ O ((αt + αλ + ακ)2) two-loop corrections to the Higgs boson masses of the CP-violating Next-to-Minimal Supersymmetric Standard Model (NMSSM) using the Feynman-diagrammatic approach in the gaugeless limit at vanishing external momentum. We choose a mixed $$ \overline{\mathrm{DR}} $$ DR ¯ -on-shell (OS) renormalisation scheme for the Higgs sector and apply both $$ \overline{\mathrm{DR}} $$ DR ¯ and OS renormalisation in the top/stop sector. For the treatment of the infrared divergences we apply and compare three different regularisation methods: the introduction of a regulator mass, the application of a small momentum expansion, and the inclusion of the full momentum dependence. Our new corrections have been implemented in the Fortran code NMSSMCALC that computes the Higgs mass spectrum of the CP-conserving and CP-violating NMSSM as well as the Higgs boson decays including the state-of-the-art higher-order corrections. Our numerical analysis shows that the newly computed corrections increase with rising λ and κ, remaining overall below about 3% compared to our previously computed $$ \mathcal{O} $$ O (αt(αt + αs)) corrections, in the region compatible with perturbativity below the GUT scale. The renormalisation scheme and scale dependence is of typical two-loop order. The impact of the CP-violating phases in the new corrections is small. We furthermore show that the Goldstone Boson Catastrophe due to the infrared divergences can be treated in a numerically efficient way by introducing a regulator mass that approximates the momentum-dependent results best for squared mass values in the permille range of the squared renormalisation scale. Our results mark another step forward in the program of increasing the precision in the NMSSM Higgs boson observables.

High $$P_T$$ Higgs excess as a signal of non-local QFT at the LHC

Non-local extensions of the Standard Model with a non-locality scale $$\varLambda _{NL}$$ Λ NL have the effect of smearing the pointlike vertices of the Standard Model. At energies significantly lower than $$\varLambda _{NL}$$ Λ NL vertices appear pointlike, while beyond this scale all beta functions vanish and all couplings approach a fixed point leading to scale invariance. Non-local SM extensions are ghost free, with the non-locality scale serving as an effective cutoff to radiative corrections of the Higgs mass. We argue that the data expected to be collected at the LHC phase 2 will have a sensitivity to non-local effects originating from a non-locality scale of a few TeV. Using an infinite derivative prescription, we study modifications to heavy vector-boson cross sections that can lead to an enhanced production of boosted Higgs bosons in a region of the kinematic phase space where the SM background is very small.

Exploring the low $$\tan \beta $$ region of two Higgs doublet models at the LHC

Current interpretations of the LHC results on two Higgs doublet models (2HDM) underestimate the sensitivity due to neglecting higher order effects. In this work, we revisit the impact of these effects using the current cross-section times branching ratio limits of the $$A\rightarrow hZ, H \rightarrow VV$$ A → h Z , H → V V and $$H\rightarrow hh$$ H → h h channels. With a degenerate heavy Higgs mass $$m_\varPhi $$ m Φ , we find that the LHC searches gain sensitivity to the small $$\tan \beta $$ tan β region after including loop corrections, even close to $$\cos (\beta -\alpha )=0$$ cos ( β - α ) = 0 which is not reachable at tree level for all types of 2HDM. For a benchmark point with $$m_\varPhi =300$$ m Φ = 300 GeV, $$\tan \beta <1.8(1.2)$$ tan β < 1.8 ( 1.2 ) can be probed for the Type-I(II) 2HDM model for $$\cos (\beta -\alpha )=0$$ cos ( β - α ) = 0 . When the deviation from $$\cos (\beta -\alpha )=0$$ cos ( β - α ) = 0 is larger, the region for which current searches have exclusion potential becomes larger.

Erratum to: Decoupling of the right-handed neutrino contribution to the Higgs mass in supersymmetric models

A Correction to this paper has been published: 10.1140/epjc/s10052-013-2522-7

Fighting off field dependence in MSSM Higgs-mass corrections of order $$\alpha _t\,\alpha _s$$ and $$\alpha _t^2$$

The connection between gauge and Higgs sectors makes supersymmetric extensions of the Standard Model predictive frameworks for the derivation of Higgs masses. In this paper, we study the contamination of such predictions by field-renormalization constants, in the MSSM with two-loop gaugeless corrections of $$\mathcal {O}\big (\alpha _{t,b}\,\alpha _s,\,\alpha _{t,b}^2\big )$$ O ( α t , b α s , α t , b 2 ) and full momentum dependence, and demonstrate how strict perturbative expansions allow to systematically neutralize the dependence on such unphysical objects. On the other hand, the popular procedure consisting in an iterative pole search remains explicitly dependent on field counterterms. We then analyze the magnitude of the intrinsic uncertainty that this feature implies for the iterative method, both in non-degenerate and near-degenerate regimes, and conclude that this strategy does not improve on the predictions of the more straightforward expansion. We also discuss several features related to the inclusion of the orders $$\alpha _{t,b}\,\alpha _s$$ α t , b α s and $$\alpha _{t,b}^2$$ α t , b 2 in the so-called ‘fixed-order’ approach, such as the resummation of UV-logarithms for heavy supersymmetric spectra.