Scientific Series

In the conventional weakly-interacting massive particle (WIMP) paradigm the late-time density of dark matter (DM) is set by the rate of two-body annihilations, but there has been considerable recent interest in exploring alternative DM scenarios where other interactions control the final abundance. I will show that by fully exploring the parameter space of a simple, weakly-coupled dark sector, we can find a rich set of novel pathways which lead to the observed relic density of DM. In particular, we can identify and characterize a general class of mechanisms in which the DM relic abundance is determined by processes controlling the thermal coupling of the DM and Standard Model (dubbed the KINetically DEcoupling Relic -- KINDER), generalizing previously-studied special cases of this behavior.

Torsion is a popular ingredient in gravity, yet fraught with quantum and classical pathologies. I develop a novel torsion theory, consistent with power-counting and unitarity. The Friedmann equations emerge (with dark energy and radiation), as do pp waves and the Schwarzschild vacuum, all without an Einstein-Hilbert term. I show that cosmology sees torsion as a non-canonical scalar, revealing a rich phenomenology of conformal or waterfall inflatons, and cuscutons. I finally argue that future work will be driven less by toy-models, and more by computer surveys. I advocate Hamiltonian and effective field theory approaches to non-Riemannian geometry in general, relevant to ultraviolet completion and modified gravity alike. Such methods should be oriented towards the ultimate test of gravity: observed cosmological structure.

A many-body quantum system that is continually monitored by an external observer may be in distinct dynamical phases, depending on whether or not the observer’s repeated local measurements prevent the buildup of long-range entanglement. The universal properties of the “measurement phase transitions” between these phases remain a challenge. In this talk I will describe new theoretical approaches to measurement phase transitions, making connections with problems in statistical mechanics such as disordered magnets and travelling waves. I will show that exact results are possible in some regimes, including for quantum circuits with all-to-all interactions. (Based on arxiv:2009.11311)

We introduce the notions of (G,q)-opers and Miura (G,q)-opers, where G is a simply-connected complex simple Lie group, and prove some general results about their structure. We then establish a one-to-one correspondence between the set of (G,q)-opers of a certain kind and the set of nondegenerate solutions of a system of XXZ Bethe Ansatz equations. This can be viewed as a generalization of the so-called quantum/classical duality which I studied with D. Gaiotto several years ago. q-Opers generalize classical side, while on the quantum side we have more general XXZ Bethe Ansatz equations. The generalization goes beyond the scope of physics of N=2 supersymmetric gauge theories.

The quantum states of matter in the immediate vicinity of a black hole can be studied using no other information than Standard Model physics combined with perturbative gravity. The point is that the relevant energy scale of the most important fields involved is low compared to the Planck scale, provided the black hole is big compared to the Planck scale. Usually this problem is investigated by using the metric that includes the effects of matter that formed the black hole in the distant past and sometimes also matter that is radiated away in the distant future.  Arguments are presented however to justify that one should ignore those effects. The metric then becomes invariant under  time translation, and this is what we need to get the energy eigen states. It is this scheme that forces us to impose the antipodal identification as a new boundary condition, giving us a beautiful picture of black hole quantum evolution. The logic of choosing this compulsory topological twist in space-time is explained. There are still many very hard questions and I hope to be able to inspire people to look into these.

In compact astrophysical objects, such as neutron star magnetospheres, black-hole accretion disk coronae and jets, the main energy reservoir is the magnetic field. The plasma processes such as magnetic reconnection and turbulence govern the extraction of that energy, which is then deposited into heat and accelerated particles and, ultimately, the observed emission. To understand what we observe, we first need to describe from first principles how these processes operate in violent regimes applicable to certain classes of compact objects, where radiative drag and pair production/annihilation play a significant role. As a specific example, I will briefly cover our state-of-the-art understanding of one of these processes — magnetic reconnection — and present the first self-consistent simulations of QED-mediated reconnection in application to neutron star magnetospheres and explain how it helps us understand the observed gamma-ray emission from these objects. I will also talk about the future prospects of this area of research; QED-mediated plasma processes also take place in a variety of other astrophysical objects, such as the accretion disk coronae in X-ray binaries, coalescing neutron stars shortly before their merger, and short X-ray bursts in magnetars.

I will discuss challenges of quantum gravity, highlighting conceptual, methodological as well as phenomenological aspects. Focusing on asymptotically safe quantum gravity, I will review recent progress in addressing key theoretical challenges using continuum and lattice methods. Furthermore, I will explain how the high predictive power of the asymptotically safe fixed point for quantum gravity and matter might allow us to explain fundamental properties of our universe, for example its dimensionality. Finally, I will point out possible connections between different approaches to quantum gravity, and how these connections might help us formulating a fundamental description of nature.

In string compactifications the roles of physics and geometry are intrinsically intertwined. While the goals of these 4-dimensional effective theories are physical, the path to those answers frequently leads to cutting-edge challenges in modern mathematics. In this talk, I will describe recent progress in characterizing the geometry of Calabi-Yau manifolds in terms their description as elliptic fibrations. This description has remarkable consequences for the form of the string vacuum space and the properties of string effective theories, including particle masses and couplings.

I will review the numerical approach to testing gauge/gravity duality using matrix models. This will lead to a summary of recent results from the BFSS, BMN and Berkooz-Douglas matrix models and a strong non-perturbative test of gauge/gravity duality.

One of the puzzles that the newly data-rich fields of cosmology and astrophysics are most advantaged to tackle is the nature of the dark sector.  In particular, a dark sector that thermalizes with the SM bath at some epoch has present-day observable properties that are directly tied to early-universe interactions. In this talk I survey some recent work on detecting different types of thermal dark particles by leveraging different cosmological and astrophysical datasets.  I discuss the utility of each of these different probes, the implication for particle theories, and prospects for the future. 

Monitored quantum dynamics has attracted much research attention recently. Environmental monitoring typically leads to the decoherence of a quantum system. We explore the effect of energy-level decoherence in quench dynamics. In particular, we consider the linear quench across quantum critical phase transitions under the influence of decoherence. Due to the critical slowing down, the system will necessarily fall out of equilibrium in the vicinity of the critical point within a time scale known as the freeze-out time. The freeze-out time will scale with the quench rate following the Kibble-Zurek scaling. In the presence of decoherence, we found a new scaling behavior differed from the Kibble-Zurek scaling. We demonstrated our findings in the critical quench between 2D Chern insulator and trivial insulator. We show that the new scaling behavior can be justified from the behavior of Hall conductivity across the quantum quench.

The Cryogenic Underground Observatory for Rare Events (CUORE), hosted at the Laboratori Nazionali del Gran Sasso in Italy, is the first tonne-scale cryogenic experiment searching for neutrinoless double-beta decay (0nuDBD) of 130Te. The observation of this process would prove that lepton number is not a symmetry of nature and that neutrinos are Majorana particles. CUORE, started in 2017, is currently in stable data taking: a raw exposure of ~ 1 tonne yr has recently been achieved. In this talk, the most recent results of CUORE for the 0nuDBD channel as well as for other physical processes of interest (2nuDBD, decays to excited states,..) will be presented, together with a review of the detector features and performance.