A very high energy hadron collider on the Moon

The long-term prospect of building a hadron collider around the circumference of a great circle of the Moon is sketched. A Circular Collider on the Moon (CCM) of ~11000 km in circumference could reach a proton-proton center-of-mass collision energy of 14 PeV --- a thousand times higher than the Large Hadron Collider at CERN --- optimistically assuming a dipole magnetic field of 20 T. Several aspects of such a project are presented, including siting, construction, availability of necessary materials on the Moon, and powering, as well as a discussion of future studies and further information needed to determine the more concrete feasibility of each. Machine parameters and vacuum requirements are explored, and an injection scheme is delineated. Other unknowns are set down. Due to the strong interest from multiple organizations in establishing a permanent Moon presence, a CCM could be the (next-to-) next-to-next-generation discovery machine and a natural successor to next-generation machines, such as the proposed Future Circular Collider at CERN or a Super Proton-Proton Collider in China, and other future machines, such as a Collider in the Sea, in the Gulf of Mexico. A CCM would serve as an important stepping stone towards a Planck-scale collider sited in our Solar System.

Review of the Geant4-DNA Simulation Toolkit for Radiobiological Applications at the Cellular and DNA Level

The Geant4-DNA low energy extension of the Geant4 Monte Carlo (MC) toolkit is a continuously evolving MC simulation code permitting mechanistic studies of cellular radiobiological effects. Geant4-DNA considers the physical, chemical, and biological stages of the action of ionizing radiation (in the form of x- and γ-ray photons, electrons and β±-rays, hadrons, α-particles, and a set of heavier ions) in living cells towards a variety of applications ranging from predicting radiotherapy outcomes to radiation protection both on earth and in space. In this work, we provide a brief, yet concise, overview of the progress that has been achieved so far concerning the different physical, physicochemical, chemical, and biological models implemented into Geant4-DNA, highlighting the latest developments. Specifically, the “dnadamage1” and “molecularDNA” applications which enable, for the first time within an open-source platform, quantitative predictions of early DNA damage in terms of single-strand-breaks (SSBs), double-strand-breaks (DSBs), and more complex clustered lesions for different DNA structures ranging from the nucleotide level to the entire genome. These developments are critically presented and discussed along with key benchmarking results. The Geant4-DNA toolkit, through its different set of models and functionalities, offers unique capabilities for elucidating the problem of radiation quality or the relative biological effectiveness (RBE) of different ionizing radiations which underlines nearly the whole spectrum of radiotherapeutic modalities, from external high-energy hadron beams to internal low-energy gamma and beta emitters that are used in brachytherapy sources and radiopharmaceuticals, respectively.

Hadron wave functions in high-energy scattering, form factors and strong decays: The effects of the Lorentz contracted form

In this paper, we study the class of the processes, where dynamics depends essentially on the properties of the hadron wave functions involved in the reactions. In this case, the momentum dependence of the form of the wave functions, imposed by the Lorentz invariance and in particular by the Lorentz contraction, can be tested in the experiment and may strongly influence the resulting cross-sections. One example of such observables is given by the hadron form factors in the case when the large [Formula: see text] behavior is mostly frozen, while the Lorentz contraction of the hadron wave functions is taken into account. Another example, considered earlier, is the strong hadron decay with high-energy emission. In this paper, we study the role of the Lorentz contraction in the high-energy hadron–hadron scattering process at large momentum transfer. For the [Formula: see text] and [Formula: see text] scattering at large [Formula: see text], it is shown that at small [Formula: see text], the picture of two exponential slopes in the differential cross-section, explained previously by the author, remains stable, while the backward scattering cross-section is strongly increased by the Lorentz contraction.

On new physics contributions to the Higgs decay to Zγ

We explore models of new physics that can give rise to large (100% or more) enhancements to the rate of Higgs decay to Zγ while still being consistent with other measurements. We show that this is impossible in simple models with one additional multiplet and also in well motivated models such as the MSSM and folded SUSY. We do find models with several multiplets that carry electroweak charge where such an enhancement is possible, but they require destructive interference effects. We also show that kinematic measurements in Higgs decay to four leptons can be sensitive to such models. Finally we explore the sensitivity of four lepton measurements to supersymmetric models and find that while the measurement is difficult with the high luminosity LHC, it may be possible with a future high energy hadron collider.

Spin and Polarization in High-Energy Hadron-Hadron and Lepton-Hadron Scattering

The role of spin degrees of freedom in high-energy hadron-hadron and lepton-hadron scattering is reviewed with emphasis on the dominant role of soft, diffractive, non-perturbative effects. Explicit models based on analyticity and Regge-pole theory, including the pomeron trajectory (gluon exchange in the t channel) are discussed. We argue that there is a single, universal pomeron in Nature, manifest as relatively “soft” or “hard”, depending on the kinematics considered. Both the pomeron and the non-leading (secondary) Regge trajectories, made of quarks are non-linear, complex functions. They are populated by a finite number of resonances: known baryons and mesons in case of the reggeons and hypothetical glueballs in case of the pomeron (“oddballs” on the odderon trajectory). Explicit models and fits are presented that may be used in recovering generalized parton distributions from deeply virtual Compton scattering and electoproduction of vector mesons.

Open string QED meson description of the X17 particle and dark matter

As a quark and an antiquark cannot be isolated, the intrinsic motion of a composite $$ q\overline{q} $$ q q ¯ system in its lowest-energy states lies predominantly in 1+1 dimensions, as in an open string with the quark and the antiquark at its two ends. Accordingly, we study the lowest-energy states of an open string $$ q\overline{q} $$ q q ¯ system in QCD and QED in 1+1 dimensions. We show that π0, η, and η′ can be adequately described as open string $$ q\overline{q} $$ q q ¯ QCD mesons. By extrapolating into the $$ q\overline{q} $$ q q ¯ QED sector in which a quark and an antiquark interact with the QED interaction, we find an open string isoscalar I(Jπ) = 0(0−) QED meson state at 17.9±1.5 MeV and an isovector (I(Jπ) = 1(0−), I3 = 0) QED meson state at 36.4±3.8 MeV. The predicted masses of the isoscalar and isovector QED mesons are close to the masses of the hypothetical X17 and E38 particles observed recently, making them good candidates for these particles. The decay products of QED mesons may show up as excess e+e− and γγ pairs in the anomalous soft photon phenomenon associated with hadron productions in high-energy hadron-proton collisions and e+-e− annihilations. Measurements of the invariant masses of excess e+e− and γγ pairs will provide tests for the existence of the open string $$ q\overline{q} $$ q q ¯ QED mesons. An assembly of gravitating QED mesons are expected to emit electron-positron pairs and/or gamma rays and their decay energies and lifetimes will be modified by their gravitational binding energies. Consequently, a self-gravitating isoscalar QED meson assembly whose mass M and radius R satisfy (M/M⨀)/(R/R⨀) ≳ 2 4.71 × 105 will not produce electron-positron pairs nor gamma rays and may be a good candidate for the primordial dark matter.