arXiv subjects

Gaurav Goswami

Publications and source records attributed to Gaurav Goswami.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

Identical Bosons, large occupation numbers and classical field description

For a system with a large number of identical Bosons, it is common to claim, often without any additional justifications, that, when the mean occupation number in a single particle state is sufficiently large, classical field description will be applicable. This is why e.g. for ultra-light dark matter, the classical field equations are used to compute its dynamics. In this work, we test the validity and robustness of this assumption based on the criterion $2 \sigma_\varphi < |\langle \varphi \rangle| $ for classical field behaviour and applying it to aribtrary quantum states. We find that an arbitrary state with large occupation number doesn't behave classically while imposing some restrictions on the state vectors can improve the classical behavior. Since coherent states are known to have quasi-classical behaviour, we also ask how much deviation from coherent state can spoil the classical behaviour. Based on this analysis, we find that it is the proximity of the state to a large occupation coherent state rather than large occupation number itself which ensures validity of classical description. Implications of this for ultra light dark matter are discussed.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2026

Impact of Primordial Black Holes Induced Neutrinos on the Cosmic 21-cm Brightness Temperature

We study the impact of neutrinos emitted from evaporating Primordial Black Holes (PBHs) on the global 21-cm absorption signal during the dark ages and pre-reionization epochs. PBHs emit neutrinos over a wide energy range through Hawking evaporation. We investigate the possibility that radiative scattering between these neutrinos and the Cosmic Neutrino Background (C$ν$B) generates secondary photons, leading to additional heating of the neutral hydrogen gas. This modifies the thermal history of the intergalactic medium and increases the global 21-cm brightness temperature relative to the standard cosmological prediction. Using the absorption feature at redshift $z\simeq17$, we derive new constraints on the PBH fraction for PBH masses in the range $10^{15}\mathrm{g}\lesssim m_{\rm BH,0}\lesssim10^{25}\mathrm{g}$. We further use existing PBH limits to constrain neutrino self-interaction couplings over a broad range of mediator masses. Our analysis complements previous studies that focused on direct photon injection from PBH evaporation and highlights the importance of neutrino-induced effects within a multimessenger framework for probing PBHs and beyond-standard-model neutrino interactions.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2025

Learning from galactic rotation curves: a neural network approach

For a galaxy, given its observed rotation curve, can one directly infer parameters of the dark matter density profile (such as dark matter particle mass $m$, scaling parameter $s$, core-to-envelope transition radius $r_t$ and NFW scale radius $r_s$), along with Baryonic parameters (such as the stellar mass-to-light ratio $Υ_*$)? In this work, using simulated rotation curves, we train neural networks, which can then be fed observed rotation curves of dark matter dominated dwarf galaxies from the SPARC catalog, to infer parameter values and their uncertainties. Since observed rotation curves have errors, we also explore the very important effect of noise in the training data on the inference. We employ two different methods to quantify uncertainties in the estimated parameters, and compare the results with those obtained using Bayesian methods. We find that the trained neural networks can extract parameters that describe observations well for the galaxies we studied.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2024

Self-interactions of ultralight spinless dark matter to the rescue?

Numerous observations on astrophysical and cosmological scales can be interpreted to mean that, in addition to the familiar kind of matter well described by the standard model of elementary particle physics, there exists Dark Matter (DM). The fundamental properties of the elementary particles which make up the DM e.g. particle mass, spin, couplings etc are currently being observationally constrained. In particular, if DM particles have spin zero, there exist recent constraints which suggest a lower limit on its mass which is often a couple of orders of magnitude larger than $10^{-22}$ eV. In this talk, we will (a) argue that these limits are based on the assumption that the self coupling of the spinless DM particles is negligible, and, (b) show how some of these lower limits will get modified in the presence of incredibly feeble self interactions.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2024

ULDM self-interactions, tidal effects and tunnelling out of satellite galaxies

It is well-known that Dark Matter (DM) inside a satellite galaxy orbiting a host halo experiences a tidal potential. If DM is ultra-light, given its wave-like nature, one expects it to tunnel out of the satellite - if this happens sufficiently quickly, then the satellite will not survive over cosmological timescales, severely constraining this dark matter model. In this paper, we study the effects of the inevitable quartic self-interaction of scalar Ultra-Light Dark Matter (ULDM) on the lifetimes of satellite galaxies by looking for quasi-stationary solutions with outgoing wave boundary conditions. For a satellite with some known core mass and orbital period, we find that, attractive (repulsive) self-interactions decrease (increase) the rate of tunnelling of DM out of it. In particular, for satellite galaxies with core mass $\sim \mathcal{O}(10^7-10^8)\ M_\odot$ and orbital period $\sim \mathcal{O}(1)\ \text{Gyr}$, one can impose constraints on the strength of self-interactions as small as $λ\sim \mathcal{O}(10^{-92})$. For instance, for ULDM mass $m = 10^{-22}\ \text{eV}$, the existence of the Fornax dwarf galaxy necessitates attractive self-interactions with $λ\lesssim -2.12 \times 10^{-91}$.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2023

Self-interactions of ULDM to the rescue?

One of the most important questions in cosmology is concerning the fundamental nature of dark matter (DM). DM could consist of spinless particles of very small mass i.e. $m \sim 10^{-22}\ \text{eV}$. This kind of ultralight dark matter (ULDM) would form cored density profiles (called "solitons") at the centre of galaxies. In this context, recently it has been argued that (a) there exists a power law relation between the mass of the soliton and mass of the surrounding halo called the Soliton-Halo (SH) relation, and, (b) the requirement of satisfying observed galactic rotation curves as well as SH relations is so stringent that ULDM is disfavoured from comprising $100\%$ of the total cosmological dark matter. In this work, we revisit these constraints for ULDM particles with non-negligible quartic self-interactions. Using a recently obtained soliton-halo relation which takes into account the effect of self-interactions, we present evidence which suggests that, for $m = 10^{-22}\ \text{eV}$, the requirement of satisfying both galactic rotation curves as well as SH relations can be fulfilled with repulsive self-coupling $λ\sim \mathcal{O}(10^{-90})$.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2022

Constraints on the mass and self-coupling of Ultra-Light Scalar Field Dark Matter using observational limits on galactic central mass

It is well known that Ultra-Light Dark Matter (ULDM), usually scalar fields of mass $m \sim 10^{-22}~{\rm eV}$, can solve some of the outstanding problems of the Cold Dark Matter (CDM) paradigm. Such a scalar field could have non-negligible self-coupling $λ$. In this work, using the known observational upper limit on the amount of centrally concentrated dark matter in a galaxy, we arrive at the observational constraints in the $λ- m$ (self coupling $-$ mass) parameter space. It is found that the observational limit on the mass $m$ of the ULDM depends upon the sign and strength of the self-interactions. We demonstrate that, for $m \sim 10^{-22}~{\rm eV}$, self-coupling values of ${\cal O}(10^{-96})$ (corresponding to a scattering length of $a_s \sim 10^{-82}~{\rm m}$) can be probed using limits on the dark matter mass within 10 pc of the centre of M87 galaxy. Our analysis suggests that if Ultra Light Axions (ULAs) form all of dark matter, its mass has to be less than $\sim 6 \times 10^{-23}$ eV.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2020

Swampland, Axions and Minimal Warm Inflation

Warm inflation has been noted previously as a possible way to implement inflationary models compatible with the dS swampland bounds. But often in these discussions the heat bath dynamics is kept largely unspecified. We point out that the recently introduced Minimal Warm Inflation of arXiv:1910.07525, where an axionic coupling of the inflaton leads to an explicit model for the thermal bath, yields models of inflation that can easily fit cosmological observations while satisfying de Sitter swampland bounds, as well as the swampland distance bound and trans-Planckian censorship.

hep-th↗

arXiv2020

Extracting the effective contact rate of COVID-19 pandemic

In the absence of any available vaccines or drugs, prevention of the spread of Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic is being achieved by putting many mitigation measures in place. It is indispensable to have robust and reliable ways of evaluating the effectiveness of these measures. In this work, we assume that, at a very coarse-grained level of description, the overall effect of all the mitigation measures is that we can still describe the spread of the pandemic using the most basic Susceptible-Exposed-Infectious-Removed ($SEIR$) model but with an "effective contact rate" ($β$) which is time-dependent. We then use the time series data of the number of infected individuals in the population to extract the instantaneous effective contact rate which is the result of various social interventions put in place. This approach has the potential to be significantly useful while evaluating the impact of mitigation measures on the spread of COVID-19 in near future.

q-bio.PE↗

arXiv2019

Trans-Planckian Censorship Conjecture and Non-thermal post-inflationary history

The recently proposed Trans-Planckian Censorship Conjecture (TCC) can be used to constrain the energy scale of inflation. The conclusions however depend on the assumptions about post-inflationary history of the Universe. E.g. in the standard case of a thermal post-inflationary history in which the Universe stays radiation dominated at all times from the end of inflation to the epoch of radiation matter equality, TCC has been used to argue that the Hubble parameter during inflation, $H_{\inf}$, is below ${\cal O}(0.1) ~{\rm GeV}$. Cosmological scenarios with a non-thermal post-inflationary history are well-motivated alternatives to the standard picture and it is interesting to find out the possible constraints which TCC imposes on such scenarios. In this work, we find out the amount of enhancement of the TCC compatible bound on $H_{\inf}$ if post-inflationary history before nucleosynthesis was non-thermal. We then argue that if TCC is correct, for a large class of scenarios, it is not possible for the Universe to have undergone a phase of moduli domination.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2019

Enhancement of axion decay constants in type IIA theory?

We investigate the possibility of enhancement of effective axion decay constant in well controlled constructions in string theory. To this end, we study the dynamics of axions arising in the compactifications of type IIA string theory on Calabi-Yau orientifolds with background fluxes (with non-perturbative effects included to ensure stabilization of all moduli). In this setup, we attempt to obtain large effective axion decay constant in two different ways: by searching for a direction in field space in which the potential is sufficiently flat and by arriving at a very explicit stringy embedding of the Kim-Nilles-Peloso (KNP) alignment mechanism. We do not find super-Planckian effective decay constants by either of the approaches. Furthermore, we find that the alignment angle of KNP mechanism can not be made arbitrarily small by adjusting the fluxes.

hep-th↗

arXiv2018

Unravelling Robustness of Deep Learning based Face Recognition Against Adversarial Attacks

Deep neural network (DNN) architecture based models have high expressive power and learning capacity. However, they are essentially a black box method since it is not easy to mathematically formulate the functions that are learned within its many layers of representation. Realizing this, many researchers have started to design methods to exploit the drawbacks of deep learning based algorithms questioning their robustness and exposing their singularities. In this paper, we attempt to unravel three aspects related to the robustness of DNNs for face recognition: (i) assessing the impact of deep architectures for face recognition in terms of vulnerabilities to attacks inspired by commonly observed distortions in the real world that are well handled by shallow learning methods along with learning based adversaries; (ii) detecting the singularities by characterizing abnormal filter response behavior in the hidden layers of deep networks; and (iii) making corrections to the processing pipeline to alleviate the problem. Our experimental evaluation using multiple open-source DNN-based face recognition networks, including OpenFace and VGG-Face, and two publicly available databases (MEDS and PaSC) demonstrates that the performance of deep learning based face recognition algorithms can suffer greatly in the presence of such distortions. The proposed method is also compared with existing detection algorithms and the results show that it is able to detect the attacks with very high accuracy by suitably designing a classifier using the response of the hidden layers in the network. Finally, we present several effective countermeasures to mitigate the impact of adversarial attacks and improve the overall robustness of DNN-based face recognition.

cs.CV↗

arXiv2018

Revisiting CMB constraints on Warm Inflation

We revisit the constraints that Planck 2015 temperature, polarization and lensing data impose on the parameters of warm inflation. To this end, we study warm inflation driven by a single scalar field with a quartic self interaction potential in the weak dissipative regime. We analyse the effect of the parameters of warm inflation, namely, the inflaton self coupling $λ$ and the inflaton dissipation parameter $Q_P$ on the CMB angular power spectrum. We constrain $λ$ and $Q_P$ for 50 and 60 number of e-foldings with the full Planck 2015 data (TT, TE, EE + lowP and lensing) by performing a Markov-Chain Monte Carlo analysis using the publicly available code {\tt CosmoMC} and obtain the joint as well as marginalized distributions of those parameters. We present our results in the form of mean and 68 \% confidence limits on the parameters and also highlight the degeneracy between $λ$ and $Q_P$ in our analysis. From this analysis we show how warm inflation parameters can be well constrained using the Planck 2015 data.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2017

Extranatural Inflation Redux

The success of a given inflationary model crucially depends upon two features: its predictions for observables such as those of the Cosmic Microwave background (CMB) and its insensitivity to the unknown ultraviolet (UV) physics such as quantum gravitational effects. Extranatural inflation is a well motivated scenario which is insensitive to UV physics by construction. In this five dimensional model, the fifth dimension is compactified on a circle and the zero mode of the fifth component of a bulk $U(1)$ gauge field acts as the inflaton. In this work, we study simple variations of the minimal extranatural inflation model in order to improve its CMB predictions while retaining its numerous merits. We find that it is possible to obtain CMB predictions identical to those of e.g. ${\cal R} + {\cal R}^2$ Starobinsky model of inflation and show that this can be done in the most minimal way by having two additional extra light fermionic species in the bulk, with the same $U(1)$ charges. We then find the constraints that CMB observations impose on the parameters of the model.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2017

Constraints on cosmological viscosity and self interacting dark matter from gravitational wave observations

It has been shown that gravitational waves propagate through ideal fluids without experiencing any dispersion or dissipation. However, if the medium has a non-zero shear viscosity $η$ , gravitational waves will be dissipated at a rate proportional to $G \,η$. We constrain dark matter and dark energy models with non-zero shear viscosity by calculating the dissipation of gravitational waves from GW150914 which propagate over a distance of $410\, $ Mpc through the dissipative fluid and comparing the data with the theoretical prediction. This provides a proof-of-principle demonstration of the fact that future observations gravitational waves at LIGO have the potential of better constraining the viscosity of dark matter and dark energy.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2016

Perturbativity, vacuum stability and inflation in the light of 750 GeV diphoton excess

The recent observation of the 750 GeV diphoton excess at 13 TeV LHC has motivated many scenarios of physics beyond the Standard Model. In this work, we begin by showing that many models which explain the observed excess tend to get strongly coupled well below the Planck scale. We then study a simple scenario involving colored vector-like fermions with exotic charges, which is expected to stay weakly coupled till the Planck scale. We find the conditions under which this happens, derive the Renormalization Group equations for such models and solve them to show that perturbativity till Planck scale can be maintained for a very reasonable choice of parameters. Finally, we discuss issues related to vacuum stability and the possibility of inflation in the scenarios we study.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2016

Constraints on just enough inflation preceded by a thermal era

If the inflationary era is preceded by a radiation dominated era in which the inflaton too was in thermal equilibrium at some very early time then the CMB data places an upper bound on the comoving temperature of the (decoupled) inflaton quanta. In addition, if one considers models of "just enough" inflation, where the number of e-foldings of inflation is just enough to solve the horizon and flatness problems, then we get a lower bound on the Hubble parameter during inflation, $H_{\rm inf}$, which is in severe conflict with the upper bound from tensor perturbations. Alternatively, imposing the upper bound on $H_{\rm inf}$ implies that such scenarios are compatible with the data only if the number of relativistic degrees of freedom in the thermal bath in the pre-inflationary Universe is extremely large (greater than $10^9$ or $10^{11})$. We are not aware of scenarios in which this can be satisfied.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2015

Higgs instability and de Sitter radiation

If the Standard Model (SM) of elementary particle physics is assumed to hold good to arbitrarily high energies, then, for the best fit values of the parameters, the scalar potential of the Standard Model Higgs field turns negative at a high scale $μ_{\rm inst}$. If the physics beyond the SM is such that it does not modify this feature of the Higgs potential and if the Hubble parameter during inflation ($H_{\rm inf}$) is such that $H_{\rm inf} \gg μ_{\rm inst}$, then, quantum fluctuations of the SM Higgs during inflation make it extremely unlikely that after inflation it will be found in the metastable vacuum at the weak scale. In this work, we assume that (i) during inflation, the SM Higgs is in Bunch-Davies vacuum state, and, (ii) the question about the stability of the effective potential must be answered in the frame of the freely falling observer (just like in Minkowski spacetime), and then use the well known fact that the freely falling observer finds Bunch-Davies vacuum to be in thermal state to show that the probability to end up in the electroweak vacuum after inflation is reasonably high.

hep-ph↗