The origin of the observed dark energy could be explained entirely within the standard model, with no new fields required. We show how the low-energy sector of the chiral QCD Lagrangian, once embedded in a non-trivial spacetime, gives rise to a cosmological vacuum energy density which can be can be presented entirely in terms of QCD parameters and the Hubble constant $H$ as $ρ_Λ\simeq H \cdot m_q\la\bar{q}q\ra /m_{η'} \sim (4.3\cdot 10^{-3} \text{eV})^4$. In this work we focus on the dynamics of the ghost fields that are essential ingredients of the aforementioned Lagrangian. In particular, we argue that the Veneziano ghost, being unphysical in the usual Minkowski QFT, becomes a physical degree of freedom if the universe is expanding. As an immediate consequence, all relevant effects are naturally very small as they are proportional to the rate of expansion $H/ \Lqcd \sim 10^{-41}$. The co-existence of these two drastically different scales ($\Lqcd \sim 100 $ MeV and $H \sim 10^{-33}$ eV) is a direct consequence of the auxiliary conditions on the physical Hilbert space that are necessary to keep the theory unitary. The exact cancellation taking place in Minkowski space due to this auxiliary condition is slightly violated when the system is upgraded to an expanding background. Nevertheless, this "tiny" effect is in fact the driving force accelerating the universe today. We also derive the time dependent equation of state $w(t)$ for the dark energy component which tracks the dynamics of the Veneziano ghost in a FLRW universe. Finally, we comment on how the same physical phenomena can be recovered in Witten's approach to the U(1) problem when the ghost degree of freedom is not even present in the system.
It has been suggested that the dark energy that explains the observed accelerating expansion of the universe may arise due to the contribution to the vacuum energy of the QCD ghost in a time-dependent background. The argument uses a four-dimensional simplified model. In this paper, we put the discussion in more realistic model keeping all components of the QCD vector ghost and show that indeed QCD ghost produces dark energy proportional to the Hubble parameter $HΛ_{QCD}^3$ ($Λ_{QCD}$ is the QCD mass scale) which has the right magnitude $\sim (3\times 10^{-3}$ eV)$^4$.
We discuss the idea that the model-independent (MI) axion of string theory is the source of quintessential dark energy. The scenario is completed with a composite QCD axion from hidden sector squark condensation that could serve as dark matter candidate. The mechanism relies on the fact that the hidden sector anomaly contribution to the composite axion is much smaller than the QCD anomaly term. This intuitively surprising scenario is based on the fact that below the hidden sector scale $Λ_h$ there are many light hidden sector quarks. Simply, by counting engineering dimensions the hidden sector…
Scalar induced gravitational waves as probes of dark QCD
Center for Joint Quantum Studies and Department of Physics, School of Science, Tianjin University（天津大学理学院量子联合研究中心与物理系）；Department of Mathematics and Physics, Huaian University（淮阴大学数学与物理学院）
We study a phenomenological dark energy model which is rooted in the Veneziano ghost of QCD. In this dark energy model, the energy density of dark energy is proportional to Hubble parameter and the proportional coefficient is of the order $Λ^3_{QCD}$, where $Λ_{QCD}$ is the mass scale of QCD. The universe has a de Sitter phase at late time and begins to accelerate at redshift around $z_{acc}\sim0.6$. We also fit this model and give the constraints on model parameters, with current observational data including SnIa, BAO, CMB, BBN and Hubble parameter data. We find that the squared sound speed o…
We present models of resonant self-interacting dark matter in a dark sector with QCD, based on analogies to the meson spectra in Standard Model QCD. For dark mesons made of two light quarks, we present a simple model that realizes resonant self-interaction (analogous to the $ϕ$-K-K system) and thermal freeze-out. We also consider asymmetric dark matter composed of heavy and light dark quarks to realize a resonant self-interaction (analogous to the $Υ(4S)$-B-B system) and discuss the experimental probes of both setups. Finally, we comment on the possible resonant self-interactions already built…
String allowed discrete symmetry is the mother of acceptable effective global symmetries at low energy. With this philosophy, we discuss dark energy, QCD axion, and inflation, and speculate some implications of the recent BICEP2 data.
It has been shown in a companion paper that the late time acceleration of the universe can be accounted for by an extension of the QCD color to a $SU(3)$ invisible sector (IQCD). In this work we discuss a unified framework such the scale of dark chiral-breaking dictates both the accelerated expansion of the universe, and the origin of dark matter. We find that the strong and gravitational dynamics of dark quarks and gluons evolve to eventually form exotic dark stars. We discuss the dynamical complexity of these dark compact objects in light of dark big bang nucleosynthesis. We argue how IQCD f…
Hidden axions may be coupled to the standard model particles through a kinetic or mass mixing with QCD axion. We study a scenario in which a hidden axion constitutes a part of or the whole of dark matter and decays into photons through the mixing, explaining the 3.5 keV X-ray line signal. Interestingly, the required long lifetime of the hidden axion dark matter can be realized for the QCD axion decay constant at an intermediate scale, if the mixing is sufficiently small. In such a two component dark matter scenario, the primordial density perturbations of the hidden axion can be highly non-Gau…
The QCD axion is a good dark matter candidate. The observed dark matter abundance can arise from misalignment or defect mechanisms, which generically require an axion decay constant $f_a \sim \mathcal{O}(10^{11})$ GeV (or higher). We introduce a new cosmological origin for axion dark matter, parametric resonance from oscillations of the Peccei-Quinn symmetry breaking field, that requires $f_a \sim (10^8 -10^{11})$ GeV. The axions may be warm enough to give deviations from cold dark matter in Large Scale Structure.
Cosmological observations on the largest scales exhibit a solid record of unexpected anomalies and alignments, apparently pointing towards a large scale violation of statistical isotropy. These include a variety of CMB measurements, as well as alignments of quasar polarisation vectors. In this paper we explore the possibility that several of the aforementioned large scale correlations are in fact not independent, and can be understood in a coherent way within the framework of a parity odd local Universe, and ultimately related to the nature of Dark Energy and its interactions with light.
The first-order nature of the chiral phase transition in QCD-like theories can play crucial roles to address a dark side of the Universe, where the created out-of equilibrium is essential to serve as cosmological and astrophysical probes such as gravitational wave productions, which have extensively been explored. This interdisciplinary physics is built based on a widely-accepted conjecture that the thermal chiral phase transition in QCD-like theories with massless (light) three flavors is of first order. We find that such a first order feature may not hold, when ordinary or dark quarks are ex…
New Source for QCD Axion Dark Matter Production: Curvature Induced
İstinye University（伊斯坦耶大学）；Tel-Aviv University（特拉维夫大学）；Johannes Gutenberg University（约翰内斯·古腾堡大学）；The University of Osaka（大阪大学）；Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron DESY（德国电子同步加速器中心）；Universität Hamburg（汉堡大学）；Universitat de València-CSIC（瓦伦西亚大学-西班牙国家研究委员会）；Khon Kaen University（孔敬大学）
A ghost dark energy model has been recently put forward to explain the current accelerated expansion of the Universe. In this model, the energy density of ghost dark energy, which comes from the Veneziano ghost of QCD, is proportional to the Hubble parameter, $ρ_D=αH$. Here $α$ is a constant of order $Λ^3_{QCD}$ where $Λ_{QCD}\sim 100 MeV$ is the QCD mass scale. We consider a connection between ghost dark energy with/without interaction between the components of the dark sector and the kinetic k-essence field. It is shown that the cosmological evolution of the ghost dark energy dominated Unive…
Discrete symmetries allowed in string compactification are the mother of all global symmetries which are broken at some level. We discuss the resulting pseudo-Goldstone bosons, in particular the QCD axion and a temporary cosmological constant, and inflatons. We also comment on some implications of the recent BICEP2 data.
We revisit the adiabatic conversion between the QCD axion and axion-like particle (ALP) at level crossing, which can occur in the early universe as a result of the existence of a hypothetical mass mixing. This is similar to the Mikheyev-Smirnov-Wolfenstein effect in neutrino oscillations. After refining the conditions for the adiabatic conversion to occur, we focus on a scenario where the ALP produced by the adiabatic conversion of the QCD axion explains the observed dark matter abundance. Interestingly, we find that the ALP decay constant can be much smaller than the ordinary case in which th…
We propose a QCD axion model that avoids the cosmological domain wall problem, introducing a global SU(3)_f family symmetry to which we embed the unwanted PQ discrete symmetry. The spontaneous breaking of SU(3)_f and PQ symmetry predicts eight NG bosons as well as axion, all of which contribute to dark radiation in the Universe. The derivation from the standard model prediction of dark radiation can be observed by future observations of CMB fluctuations. Our model also predicts a sizable exotic kaon decay rate, which is marginally consistent with the present collider data and would be tested b…
We strengthen the cosmological bound on the axion mass, by solving the momentum-dependent Boltzmann equations for axion-pion scatterings and by using a phenomenological production rate derived from pion-pion scattering data, overcoming the breakdown of chiral perturbation theory. Using present cosmological datasets we obtain $m_a\leq 0.24~\text{eV}$. To further improve the bound and exploit the reach of upcoming cosmological surveys, reliable non-perturbative calculations above the QCD crossover are needed.
We propose a multi-messenger probe of QCD axion Dark Matter based on observations of black hole-neutron star binary inspirals. It is suggested that a dense Dark Matter spike may grow around intermediate mass black holes ($10^{3}-10^{5} \mathrm{\,M_{\odot}}$). The presence of such a spike produces two unique effects: a distinct phase shift in the gravitational wave strain during the inspiral and an enhancement of the radio emission due to the resonant axion-photon conversion occurring in the neutron star magnetosphere throughout the inspiral and merger. Remarkably, the observation of the gravit…
The two dominant components of the cosmic budget today, pressureles matter and dark energy, may or may not be interacting with each other. Currently, both possibilities appear compatible with observational data. We propose several criteria based on the history of the Hubble factor that can help discern whether they are interacting and whether dark energy is phantom or quintessence in nature.
In this paper, we perform a full next-to-leading order (NLO) QCD calculation of neutralino scattering on protons or neutrons in the MSSM. We match the results of the NLO QCD calculation to the scalar and axial-vector operators in the effective field theory approach. These govern the spin-independent and spin-dependent detection rates, respectively. The calculations have been performed for general bino, wino and higgsino decompositions of neutralino dark matter and required a novel tensor reduction method of loop integrals with vanishing relative velocities and Gram determinants. Numerically, t…
We revisit the isocurvature density perturbations induced by quantum fluctuations of the axion field by extending a recently developed analytic method and approximations to a time-dependent scalar potential, which enables us to follow the evolution of the axion until it starts to oscillate. We find that, as the initial misalignment angle approaches the hilltop of the potential, the isocurvature perturbations become significantly enhanced, while the non-Gaussianity parameter increases slowly but surely. As a result, the isocurvature constraint on the inflation scale is tightened as Hinf < O(100…
The domain wall problem of the Peccei-Quinn mechanism can be solved if the Peccei-Quinn symmetry is explicitly broken by a small amount. Domain walls decay into axions, which may account for dark matter of the universe. This scheme is however strongly constrained by overproduction of axions unless the phase of the explicit breaking term is tuned. We investigate the case where the universe is matter-dominated around the temperature of the MeV scale and domain walls decay during this matter dominated epoch. We show how the viable parameter space is expanded.
The accelerating expansion of the Universe points to a small positive vacuum energy density and negative vacuum pressure. A strong candidate is the cosmological constant in Einstein's equations of General Relativity. The vacuum dark energy density extracted from astrophysics is 10^56 times smaller than the value expected from the Higgs potential in Standard Model particle physics. The dark energy scale is however close to the range of possible values expected for the light neutrino mass. We investigate this physics in a simple toy model where the chirality of the neutrino is treated by analogy…
Isocurvature-Free QCD Axion Dark Matter from Inflaton-Driven Early QCD: the Necessity of Inflationary Plateaus
The University of Texas at Austin（德克萨斯大学奥斯汀分校）；Stockholm University（斯德哥尔摩大学）；Nordic Institute for Theoretical Physics (NORDITA)（北欧理论物理研究所）；Harvard University（哈佛大学）；University of Utah（犹他大学）
We investigate the possibility that the Peccei-Quinn phase transition occurs at a temperature far below the symmetry breaking scale. Low phase transition temperatures are typical in supersymmetric theories, where symmetry breaking fields have small masses. We find that QCD axions are abundantly produced just after the phase transition. The observed dark matter abundance is reproduced even if the decay constant is much lower than $10^{11}$ GeV. The produced axions tend to be warm. For some range of the decay constant, the effect of the predicted warmness on structure formation can be confirmed …
First constraints on QCD axion dark matter using James Webb Space Telescope observations
Flatiron Institute（平顿研究所）；Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics（理论物理前沿研究所）；Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory（费米国家加速器实验室）；University of Chicago（芝加哥大学）
We show that dark matter can be accounted for by an axion that solves the strong CP problem, but is much lighter than usual due to a $Z_\mathcal{N}$ symmetry. The whole mass range from the canonical QCD axion down to the ultra-light regime is allowed, with $3\le\mathcal{N}\lesssim65$. This includes the first proposal of a "fuzzy dark matter" QCD axion with $m_a\sim10^{-22}$ eV. A novel misalignment mechanism occurs --{\it trapped misalignment}-- due to the peculiar temperature dependence of the $Z_{\mathcal{N}}$ axion potential. The dark matter relic density is enhanced because the axion field…
Democracy among the same type of particles is a useful paradigm in studying masses and interactions of particles with supersymmetry(SUSY) or without SUSY. This simple idea predicts the presence of massless particles. We attempt to use one of these massless pseudoscalar particles as generating the cosmological dark energy(DE) potential. To achieve the extremely shallow potential of DE, the pseudoscalar boson is required not to couple to the QCD anomaly. So, we consider two pseudoscalars, one coupling to the QCD anomaly (i.e. QCD axion) and the other not coupling to the QCD anomaly. To obtain th…
A new dark energy model called "ghost dark energy" was recently suggested to explain the observed accelerating expansion of the universe. This model originates from the Veneziano ghost of QCD. The dark energy density is proportional to Hubble parameter, $ρ_D=αH$, where $α$ is a constant of order $Λ_{\rm QCD}^3$ and $Λ_{\rm QCD}\sim 100 MeV$ is QCD mass scale. In this paper, we extend the ghost dark energy model to the universe with spatial curvature in the presence of interaction between dark matter and dark energy. We study cosmological implications of this model in detail. In the absence of …
The difference between vacuum energy of quantum fields in Minkowski space and in Friedmann-Robterson-Walker universe might be related to the observed dark energy. The vacuum energy of the Veneziano ghost field introduced to solve the $U(1)_A$ problem in QCD is of the form, $ H+ {\cal O}(H^2)$. Based on this, we study the dynamical evolution of a phenomenological dark energy model whose energy density is of the form $αH+βH^2$. In this model, the universe approaches to a de Sitter phase at late times. We fit the model with current observational data including SnIa, BAO, CMB, BBN, Hubble paramete…
We study the mirror world with dark matter arising from the thermal freeze-out of the lightest, stable mirror particle -- the mirror electron. The dark matter abundance is achieved for mirror electrons of mass 225 GeV, fixing the mirror electroweak scale near $10^8$ GeV. This highly predictive scenario is realized by an axion that acts as a portal between the two sectors through its coupling to the QCD and mirror QCD sectors. The axion is more massive than the standard QCD axion due to additional contributions from mirror strong dynamics. Still, the strong CP problem is solved by this "heavy" …
We show that Big Bang Nucleosynthesis (BBN) significantly constrains axion-like dark matter. The axion acts like an oscillating QCD $θ$ angle that redshifts in the early universe, increasing the neutron-proton mass difference at neutron freeze-out. An axion-like particle that couples too strongly to QCD results in the underproduction of 4He during BBN and is thus excluded. The BBN bound overlaps with much of the parameter space that would be covered by proposed searches for time-varying neutron EDMs. The QCD axion does not couple strongly enough to affect BBN.
The entropy production prior to BBN era is one of ways to prevent QCD axion with the decay constant $F_{a}\in[10^{12}{\rm GeV},10^{16}{\rm GeV}]$ from overclosing the universe when the misalignment angle is $θ_{\rm i}=\mathcal{O}(1)$. As such, it is necessarily accompanied by an early matter-dominated era (EMD) provided the entropy production is achieved via the decay of a heavy particle. In this work, we consider the possibility of formation of primordial black holes during the EMD era with the assumption of the enhanced primordial scalar perturbation on small scales ($k>10^{4}{\rm Mpc}^{-1}$…
We study cosmological effects of explicit Peccei-Quinn breaking on the QCD axion dark matter. We find that the axion abundance decreases or increases significantly depending on the initial position, even for a tiny Peccei-Quinn breaking that satisfies the experimental bound of the neutron electric dipole measurements. If the axion first starts to oscillate around a wrong vacuum and if it gets trapped there until the false vacuum disappears due to non-perturbative QCD effects, its abundance increases significantly and is independent of the decay constant $f_a$, as first pointed out in [JHEP 06 …
In this talk, we discuss the physics modelling of particle spectra arising from dark matter (DM) annihilation or decay. In the context of the indirect searches of DM, the final state products will, in general, undergo a set of complicated processes such as resonance decays, QED/QCD radiation, hadronisation and hadron decays. This set of processes lead to stable particles (photons, positrons, anti-protons, and neutrinos among others) which travel for very long distances before reaching the detectors. The modelling of their spectra contains some uncertainties which are often neglected in the rel…
Search for QCD axion dark matter with transmon qubits and quantum circuit
Kyoto University（京都大学）；The University of Tokyo（东京大学）；International Center for Elementary Particle Physics (ICEPP), The University of Tokyo（东京大学 elementary particle physics 国际中心）；KEK（高能加速器研究机构）
New QCD-like `hypercolor' sectors can generate a broad class of new signatures at hadron colliders and furnish a variety of dark matter candidates. Paired diboson resonances are a particularly important collider signature, arising both from $CP$-conserving vector hypermeson decays of the form $\widetildeρ\rightarrow\widetildeπ\widetildeπ\rightarrow 4V$ and from $CP$-violating pseudoscalar hypermeson decays of the form $\widetildeη\rightarrow \widetildeπ\widetildeπ\rightarrow 4V$. The latter are sensitive to the vacuum angle $\widetilde θ$ in the hypercolor sector. We study single- and paired-d…
The recently sharpened H_0 tension is argued not to be a result of data calibration or other systematic but an indication for the common nature of dark matter and dark energy. This conclusion is devised within modified weak-field General Relativity where the accelerated expansion of the Universe and the dynamics of galaxy groups and clusters are described by the same parameter, the cosmological constant. The common nature of the dark sector hence will result in intrinsic discrepancy/tension between the local and global determinations of values of the Hubble constant.
Many existing and proposed experiments targeting QCD axion dark matter (DM) can also search for a broad class of axion-like particles (ALPs). We analyze the experimental sensitivities to electromagnetically-coupled ALP DM in different cosmological scenarios with the relic abundance set by the misalignment mechanism. We obtain benchmark DM targets for the standard thermal cosmology, a pre-nucleosynthesis period of early matter domination, and a period of kination. These targets are theoretically simple and assume $\mathcal{O}(1)$ misalignment angles, avoiding fine-tuning of the initial conditio…
We study structure formation using relativistic cosmological linear perturbation theory in the presence of intrinsic and relative (with respect to matter) non-adiabatic dark energy perturbations. For different dark energy models we assess the impact of non-adiabaticity on the matter growth promoting a comparison with growth rate data. The dark energy models studied lead to peculiar signatures of the (non)adiabatic nature of dark energy perturbations in the evolution of the $f σ_{8}(z)$ observable. We show that non-adiabatic DE models become close to be degenerated with respect to the $Λ$CDM mo…
The annihilation of non-relativistic dark matter particles at tree level can be strongly enhanced by the radiation of an additional gauge boson. This is particularly true for the helicity-suppressed annihilation of Majorana particles, like neutralinos, into fermion pairs. Surprisingly, and despite the potentially large effect due to the strong coupling, this has so far been studied in much less detail for the internal bremsstrahlung of gluons than for photons or electroweak gauge bosons. Here, we aim at bridging that gap by presenting a general analysis of neutralino annihilation into quark an…
The LIGO/Virgo collaboration have by now detected the mergers of ten black hole binaries via the emission of gravitational radiation. The hypothesis that these black holes have formed during the cosmic QCD epoch and make up all of the cosmic dark matter, has been rejected by many authors reasoning that, among other constraints, primordial black hole (PBH) dark matter would lead to orders of magnitude larger merger rates than observed. We revisit the calculation of the present PBH merger rate. Solar mass PBHs form clusters at fairly high redshifts, which evaporate at lower redshifts. We conside…
