Search Talks

After the detection of black hole and neutron star binary mergers at LIGO/Virgo, gravitational wave becomes a new observational channel that we didn't have access to years ago.

It is an interesting question to ask what kind of new particle physics this channel can probe.

To answer this question, one needs to fill the gap between the scales of the astrophysical processes and the fundamental structures.

In this talk, I will demonstrate a few ways of extracting particle physics information directly from binary merger events of neutron stars and boson stars, and using this information to constrain well motivated dark sectors, including dark gauge boson and axion like particles.

An outline of future directions will also be discussed.

Line Intensity Mapping has emerged as a powerful tool to probe the large-scale structure across redshift, with the potential to shed light on dark energy at low redshift and the cosmic dawn and reionization process at high redshift.  Multiple spectral lines, including the redshifted 21cm, CO, [CII], H-alpha, and Lyman-alpha emissions, are promising tracers in the intensity mapping regime, with several experiments on-going or in the planning.  I will discuss results from current pilot programs, prospects for the upcoming TIME experiment, and the outlook of future space missions such as SPHEREx.  I will illustrate how the use of cross-correlation between multiple line intensity maps will enable unique and insightful measurements, revealing for example the tomography of reionization and the physics of multiple phases of the interstellar medium across redshift.

Recent progress in determining scattering phase shifts, and hence, resonance properties from lattice QCD in finite volumes is presented.

The relationship between finite-volume stationary-state energies and the two-particle scattering K-matrix is discussed.

Details of the Monte Carlo computations of the finite-volume two-particle energies are described.

Results for pion-pion, kaon-pion, and nucleon-pion scattering are presented.

The large j asymptotic behavior of 4-dimensional spin foam amplitude is investigated for the extended spin foam model (Conrady-Hnybida extension) on a simplicial complex. We study the most general situation in which timelike tetrahedra with timelike triangles are taken into account. The large j asymptotic behavior is determined by critical configurations of the amplitude. We identify the critical configurations that correspond to the Lorentzian simplicial geometries with timelike tetrahedra and triangles. Their contributions to the amplitude are phases asymptotically, whose exponents equal to Regge action of gravity. The amplitude also contains critical configurations corresponding to non-degenerate split signature 4-simplices and degenerate vector geometries.  

Searching for a proper set of order parameters which distinguishes different phases of matter sits in the heart of condensed matter physics. In this talk, I discuss topological invariants as (non-local) order parameters for symmetry protected topological (SPT) phases of fermions in the presence of time-reversal symmetry. It turns out that topological invariants provide a natural definition for the partial transpose of density matrices. The partial transpose can then be used to define an entanglement measure (analog of entanglement negativity) for mixed states of fermions. I will show that this quantity captures the mixed state entanglement in fermionic SPTs as well as in a system of free fermions with a Fermi surface.

Conventional equations of state suggest that in complete gravitational collapse a singular state of matter with infinite density could be reached finally to a black hole, the characteristic feature of which is its apparent horizon, where light rays are first trapped. The loss of information to the outside world this implies gives rise to serious difficulties with well-established principles of quantum mechanics and statistical physics.

The formation of a gravitational vacuum condensate star with a p=−ρ interior solves these problems and remarkably, actually follows from Schwarzschild's second paper over a century ago. The surface tension of the condensate star surface is the difference of equal and opposite surface gravities between the exterior and interior Schwarzschild solutions. The First Law is then recognized as a purely mechanical classical relation at zero temperature and zero entropy. The Schwarzschild time of such a non-singular gravitational condensate star is a global time, fully consistent with unitary time evolution in quantum theory.

The advent of BH imaging by the EHT and Gravitational Wave Astronomy with LIGO should allow for observational tests of the gravastar hypothesis, particularly in the discrete surface modes of oscillation and GW resonances or “echoes,” which may be observable by advanced LIGO and successor GW detectors.

Classical chaotic systems exhibit exponential divergence of initially infinitesimally close trajectories, which is characterized by the Lyapunov exponent. This sensitivity to initial conditions is popularly known as the  "butterfly effect." Of great recent interest has been to understand how/if the butterfly effect and Lyapunov exponents generalize to quantum mechanics, where the notion of a trajectory does not exist. In this talk, I will introduce the measure of quantum chaoticity  – a so-called out-of-time-ordered four-point correlator (whose semiclassical limit reproduces classical Lyapunov growth), and use it to describe quantum chaotic dynamics and its eventual disappearance in the standard models of classical and quantum chaos – Bunimovich stadium billiard and standard map or kicked rotor [1]. I will describe our recent results on the quantum Lyapunov exponent in these single-particle models as well as results in interacting many-body systems, such as disordered metals [2]. The latter many-body model exhibits an interaction-induced transition from quantum chaotic to non-chaotic dynamics, which may manifest itself in a sharp change of the distribution of energy levels from Wigner-Dyson to Poisson statistics. I will conclude by formulating a many-body analogue of the Bohigas-Giannoni-Schmit conjecture.
References:
[1] "Lyapunov exponent and out-of-time-ordered correlator's growth rate in a chaotic system,"  E. Rozenbaum, S. Ganeshan, and V. Galitski, Physical Review Letters 118, 086801 (2017)
[2] "Non-linear sigma model approach to many-body quantum chaos," Y. Liao and and V. Galitski, arXiv:1807.09799

Dr. Avery Broderick will provide a highly accessible and interesting lecture on the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) and international efforts to interpret horizon-resolving images of numerous supermassive black holes. Black holes are among the most powerful and mysterious phenomena in the universe. Almost every galaxy has at its core a supermassive black hole, millions or even billions of times more massive than our sun. Despite composing a small fraction of the galactic mass budgets, they set the stage for astrophysical dramas that dictate the fates of their hosts. Though black holes are in theory the ultimate manifestation of strong gravity’s impact on the visible universe, placing these exotic phenomena on concrete empirical footing has been impossible - until now.