arXiv subjects

J. Bernabeu

Publications and source records attributed to J. Bernabeu.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2025

The Aharonov-Bohm effect for a constant scalar matter potential in neutrino flavour interferometry

The Aharonov-Bohm effect is one of the most surprising wonders of the quantum world. The observed solenoid effect, as well as others, shows that a particle is affected by the potential in a region in which there is no force-field. This is so through the phase of the probability amplitude. Its interpretation is debated between a physical significance of the potential versus non-locality of quantum physics with the presence of the force-field generated by the potential difference outside this region. We demonstrate that the debate is resolved with the idea of replacing spatial interference by flavour interferometry as observed in neutrino oscillations. The neutrino propagation through the crust of the Earth in current facilities is affected by a constant scalar matter potential and the phase difference is in flavour internal properties. Here we show how to signal and experimentally disentangle the phase-shift due to the potential by means of observables characteristic of its symmetry properties. The energy dependence of the neutrino-antineutrino asymmetry in the golden transition $\nu_\mu \rightarrow \nu_e$ allows a clear separation of the matter component against the genuine asymmetry in the absence of the potential. These findings define, in a perfect symbiosis between quantum physics and particle physics, the path to observe in a single experiment the physical significance of the potential, the neutrino mass hierarchy and the genuine matter-antimatter asymmetry in the lepton sector.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2021

First search for dyons with the full MoEDAL trapping detector in 13 TeV pp collisions

The MoEDAL trapping detector, consists of approximately 800 kg of aluminium volumes. It was exposed during Run-2 of the LHC program to 6.46 fb^-1 of 13 TeV proton-proton collisions at the LHCb interaction point. Evidence for dyons (particles with electric and magnetic charge) captured in the trapping detector was sought by passing the aluminium volumes comprising the detector through a SQUID magnetometer. The presence of a trapped dyon would be signalled by a persistent current induced in the SQUID magnetometer. On the basis of a Drell-Yan production model, we exclude dyons with a magnetic charge ranging up to 5 Dirac charges, and an electric charge up to 200 times the fundamental electric charge for mass limits in the range 790 - 3130 GeV.

hep-ex↗

arXiv2018

Signatures of the genuine and matter-induced components of the CP violation asymmetry in neutrino oscillations

CP asymmetries for neutrino oscillations in matter can be disentangled into the matter-induced CPT-odd (T-invariant) component and the genuine T-odd (CPT-invariant) component. For their understanding in terms of the relevant ingredients, we develop a new perturbative expansion in both $Δm^2_{21},\, |a| \ll |Δm^2_{31}|$ without any assumptions between $Δm^2_{21}$ and $a$, and study the subtleties of the vacuum limit in the two terms of the CP asymmetry, moving from the CPT-invariant vacuum limit $a \to 0$ to the T-invariant limit $Δm^2_{21} \to 0$. In the experimental region of terrestrial accelerator neutrinos, we calculate their approximate expressions from which we prove that, at medium baselines, the CPT-odd component is small and nearly $δ$-independent, so it can be subtracted from the experimental CP asymmetry as a theoretical background, provided the hierarchy is known. At long baselines, on the other hand, we find that (i) a Hierarchy-odd term in the CPT-odd component dominates the CP asymmetry for energies above the first oscillation node, and (ii) the CPT-odd term vanishes, independent of the CP phase $δ$, at $E =0.92~\mathrm{GeV}\,(L/1300~\mathrm{km})$ near the second oscillation maximum, where the T-odd term is almost maximal and proportional to $\sinδ$. A measurement of the CP asymmetry in these energy regions would thus provide separate information on (i) the neutrino mass ordering, and (ii) direct evidence of genuine CP violation in the lepton sector.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2018

Disentangling genuine from matter-induced CP violation in neutrino oscillations

We prove that, in any flavor transition, neutrino oscillation CP violating asymmetries in matter have two disentangled components: i) a CPT-odd T-invariant term, non-vanishing iff there are interactions with matter; ii) a T-odd CPT-invariant term, non-vanishing iff there is genuine CP violation. As function of the baseline, these two terms are distinct L-even and L-odd observables to separately test (i) matter effects sensitive to the neutrino hierarchy and (ii) genuine CP violation in the neutrino sector. For the golden $ν_μ\to ν_e$ channel, the different energy distributions of the two components provide a signature of their separation. At long baselines, they show oscillations in the low energy region, with zeros at different positions and peculiar behavior around the zeros. We discover a magic energy $E = (0.91 \pm 0.01)$ GeV at L = 1300 km with vanishing CPT-odd term and maximal genuine CP asymmetry proportional to $\sinδ$, with $δ$ the weak CP phase. For energies above 1.5 GeV, the sign of the CP asymmetry discriminates the neutrino hierarchy.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2017

The W and Z boson spin observables as messengers of new physics at LHC

The successful LHC operation suggests going beyond the search of excess of events for the quest of new physics. We demonstrate that the eight multipole parameters describing the spin state of the W or Z bosons are able to disentangle their hidden production mechanism. They can be separately extracted from well defined angular asymmetries in the leptonic distribution of boson decays. The discriminating power of this analysis is well illustrated by: (i) polarised top quark decays, (ii) two body decay of heavy resonances, (iii) Drell-Yan production of Z plus jets, (iv) Z boson plus missing transverse energy.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2017

Stimulated X-rays in resonant atom Majorana mixing

Massive neutrinos demand to ask whether they are Dirac or Majorana particles. Majorana neutrinos are an irrefutable proof of physics beyond the Standard Model. Neutrinoless double electron capture is not a process but a virtual $ΔL=2$ mixing between a parent $^AZ$ atom and a daughter $^A(Z-2)$ excited atom with two electron holes. As a mixing between two neutral atoms and the observable signal in terms of emitted two-hole X-rays, the strategy, experimental signature and background are different from neutrinoless double beta decay. The mixing is resonantly enhanced for almost degeneracy and, under these conditions, there is no irreducible background from the standard two-neutrino channel. We reconstruct the natural time history of a nominally stable parent atom since its production either by nature or in the laboratory. After the time periods of atom oscillations and the decay of the short-lived daughter atom, at observable times the relevant "stationary" states are the mixed metastable long-lived state and the short-lived excited state, as well as the ground state of the daughter atom. Their natural population inversion is most appropriate for exploiting the bosonic nature of the observed X-rays by means of stimulating X-ray beams. Among different observables of the atom Majorana mixing, we include the enhanced rate of stimulated X-ray emission from the long-lived metastable state by a high-intensity X-ray beam. A gain factor of 100 can be envisaged in a facility like European XFEL.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2016

Discrete Symmetries CP, T, CPT

The role of Symmetry Breaking mechanisms to search for New Physics is of highest importance. We discuss the status and prospects of the Discrete Symmetries CP, T, CPT looking for their separate Violation in LHC experiments and meson factories.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2016

Breaking down the entire W boson spin observables from its decay

We discuss the eight independent spin observables for the $W$ boson in terms of its vector and tensor polarizations and identify the angular distributions and asymmetries able to separate them in collider experiments. The results are applied to the study of polarized top quark decays and diboson resonances. These novel observables are of great value for disentangling new physics mechanisms in $W$ boson production.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2015

METing SUSY on the Z peak

Recently the ATLAS experiment announced a 3 $σ$ excess at the Z-peak consisting of 29 pairs of leptons together with two or more jets, $E_T^{\rm miss}> 225$ GeV and $H_T \geq 600$ GeV, to be compared with $10.6 \pm 3.2$ expected lepton pairs in the Standard Model. No excess outside the Z-peak was observed. By trying to explain this signal with SUSY we find that only relatively light gluinos, $m_{\tilde g} \lesssim 1.2$ TeV, together with a heavy neutralino NLSP of $m_{\tilde χ} \gtrsim 400$ GeV decaying predominantly to Z-boson plus a light gravitino, such that nearly every gluino produces at least one Z-boson in its decay chain, could reproduce the excess. We construct an explicit general gauge mediation model able to reproduce the observed signal overcoming all the experimental limits. Needless to say, more sophisticated models could also reproduce the signal, however, any model would have to exhibit the following features, light gluinos, or heavy particles with a strong production cross-section, producing at least one Z-boson in its decay chain. The implications of our findings for the Run II at LHC with the scaling on the Z peak, as well as for the direct search of gluinos and other SUSY particles, are pointed out.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2015

Probing CPT in transitions with entangled neutral kaons

In this paper we present a novel CPT symmetry test in the neutral kaon system based, for the first time, on the direct comparison of the probabilities of a transition and its CPT reverse. The required interchange of "in" $\leftrightarrow$ "out" states for a given process is obtained exploiting the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen correlations of neutral kaon pairs produced at a $ϕ$-factory. The observable quantities have been constructed by selecting the two semileptonic decays for flavour tag, the $ππ$ and $3π^0$ decays for CP tag and the time orderings of the decay pairs. The interpretation in terms of the standard Weisskopf-Wigner approach to this system, directly connects CPT violation in these observables to the violating $\Reδ$ parameter in the mass matrix of $K^0$-$\bar{K^0}$, a genuine CPT violating effect independent of $ΔΓ$ and not requiring the decay as an essential ingredient. Possible spurious effects induced by CP violation in the decay and/or a violation of the $ΔS= ΔQ$ rule have been shown to be well under control. The proposed test is thus fully robust, and might shed light on possible new CPT violating mechanisms, or further improve the precision of the present experimental limits. It could be implemented at the DA$Φ$NE facility in Frascati, where the KLOE-2 experiment might reach a statistical sensitivity of $\mathcal{O}(10^{-3})$ on the newly proposed observable quantities.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2014

Colloquium: Time-reversal violation with quantum-entangled B mesons

Symmetry transformations have been proven a bedrock tool for understanding the nature of particle interactions, formulating and testing fundamental theories. Based on the up to now unbroken CPT symmetry, the violation of the CP symmetry between matter and antimatter by weak interactions, discovered in the decay of kaons in 1964 and observed more recently in 2001 in B mesons, strongly suggests that the behavior of these particles under weak interactions must also be asymmetric under time reversal T. However, until the recent years there has not been a direct detection of the expected time-reversal violation in the time evolution of any system. This Colloquium examines the field of time-reversal symmetry breaking in the fundamental laws of physics. For transitions, its observation requires an asymmetry with exchange of initial and final states. We discuss the conceptual basis for such an exchange with unstable particles, using the quantum properties of Einstein Podolsky-Rosen (EPR) entanglement available at B meson factories combined with the decay as a filtering measurement. The method allows a clear-cut separation of different transitions between flavor and CP eigenstates in the decay of neutral B mesons. These ideas have been implemented for the experiment by the BaBar Collaboration at SLAC's B factory. The results, presented in 2012, prove beyond any doubt the violation of time-reversal invariance in the time evolution between these two states of the neutral B meson.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2013

Consistent Probabilistic Description of the Neutral Kaon System

The neutral Kaon system has both CP violation in the mass matrix and a non-vanishing lifetime difference in the width matrix. This leads to an effective Hamiltonian which is not a normal operator, with incompatible (non-commuting) masses and widths. In the Weisskopf-Wigner Approach (WWA), by diagonalizing the entire Hamiltonian, the unphysical non-orthogonal "stationary" states $K_{L,S}$ are obtained. These states have complex eigenvalues whose real (imaginary) part does not coincide with the eigenvalues of the mass (width) matrix. In this work we describe the system as an open Lindblad-type quantum mechanical system due to Kaon decays. This approach, in terms of density matrices for initial and final states, provides a consistent probabilistic description, avoiding the standard problems because the width matrix becomes a composite operator not included in the Hamiltonian. We consider the dominant-decay channel to two pions, so that one of the Kaon states with definite lifetime becomes stable. This new approach provides results for the time dependent decay rates in agreement with those of the WWA.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2012

Time Reversal Violation from the entangled B0-antiB0 system

We discuss the concepts and methodology to implement an experiment probing directly Time Reversal (T) non-invariance, without any experimental connection to CP violation, by the exchange of "in" and "out" states. The idea relies on the B0-antiB0 entanglement and decay time information available at B factories. The flavor or CP tag of the state of the still living neutral meson by the first decay of its orthogonal partner overcomes the problem of irreversibility for unstable systems, which prevents direct tests of T with incoherent particle states. T violation in the time evolution between the two decays means experimentally a difference between the intensities for the time-ordered (l^+ X, J/psi K_S) and (J/psi K_L, l^- X) decays, and three other independent asymmetries. The proposed strategy has been applied to simulated data samples of similar size and features to those currently available, from which we estimate the significance of the expected discovery to reach many standard deviations.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2012

Direct test of time-reversal symmetry in the entangled neutral kaon system at a $ϕ$-factory

We present a novel method to perform a direct T (time reversal) symmetry test in the neutral kaon system, independent of any CP and/or CPT symmetry tests. This is based on the comparison of suitable transition probabilities, where the required interchange of in <-> out states for a given process is obtained exploiting the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen correlations of neutral kaon pairs produced at a $ϕ$-factory. In the time distribution between the two decays, we compare a reference transition like the one defined by the time ordered decays $(\ell^-,ππ)$ with the T -conjugated one defined by $(3π^0, \ell^+)$. With the use of this and other T conjugated comparisons, the KLOE-2 experiment at DA$Φ$NE could make a significant test.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2011

A Layer Correlation technique for pion energy calibration at the 2004 ATLAS Combined Beam Test

A new method for calibrating the hadron response of a segmented calorimeter is developed and successfully applied to beam test data. It is based on a principal component analysis of energy deposits in the calorimeter layers, exploiting longitudinal shower development information to improve the measured energy resolution. Corrections for invisible hadronic energy and energy lost in dead material in front of and between the calorimeters of the ATLAS experiment were calculated with simulated Geant4 Monte Carlo events and used to reconstruct the energy of pions impinging on the calorimeters during the 2004 Barrel Combined Beam Test at the CERN H8 area. For pion beams with energies between 20 GeV and 180 GeV, the particle energy is reconstructed within 3% and the energy resolution is improved by between 11% and 25% compared to the resolution at the electromagnetic scale.

physics.ins-det↗

arXiv2011

T and CPT Symmetries in Entangled Neutral Meson Systems

Genuine tests of an asymmetry under T and/or CPT transformations imply the interchange between in-states and out-states. I explain a methodology to perform model-indepedent separate measurements of the three CP, T and CPT symmetry violations for transitions involving the decay of the neutral meson systems in B- and Φ-factories. It makes use of the quantum-mechanical entanglement only, for which the individual state of each neutral meson is not defined before the decay of its orthogonal partner. The final proof of the independence of the three asymmetries is that no other theoretical ingredient is involved and that the event sample corresponding to each case is different from the other two. The experimental analysis for the measurements of these three asymmetries as function of the time interval Δt > 0 between the first and second decays is discussed, as well as the significance of the expected results. In particular, one may advance a first observation of true, direct, evidence of Time-Reserval-Violation in B-factories by many standard deviations from zero, without any reference to, and independent of, CP-Violation. In some quantum gravity framework the CPT-transformation is ill-defined, so there is a resulting loss of particle-antiparticle identity. This mechanism induces a breaking of the EPR correlation in the entanglement imposed by Bose statistics to the neutral meson system, the so-called ω-effect. I present results and prospects for the ω-parameter in the correlated neutral meson-antimeson states.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2010

W polarisation beyond helicity fractions in top quark decays

We calculate the density matrix for the decay of a polarised top quark into a polarised W boson and a massive b quark, for the most general Wtb vertex arising from dimension-six gauge-invariant effective operators. We show that, in addition to the well-known W helicity fractions, for polarised top decays it is worth to define and study the transverse and normal W polarisation fractions, that is, the W polarisation along two directions orthogonal to its momentum. In particular, a rather simple forward-backward asymmetry in the normal direction is found to be very sensitive to complex phases in one of the Wtb anomalous couplings. This asymmetry, which indicates a normal W polarisation, can be generated for example by a P-odd, T-odd transition electric dipole moment. We also investigate the angular distribution of decay products in the top quark rest frame, calculating the spin analysing powers for a general Wtb vertex. Finally we show that, using a combined fit to top decay observables and the tW cross section, at LHC it will be possible to obtain model-independent measurements of all the (complex) Wtb couplings as well as the single top polarisation. Implications for spin correlations in top pair production are also discussed.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2010

Physics with the KLOE-2 experiment at the upgraded DA$ϕ$NE

Investigation at a $ϕ$--factory can shed light on several debated issues in particle physics. We discuss: i) recent theoretical development and experimental progress in kaon physics relevant for the Standard Model tests in the flavor sector, ii) the sensitivity we can reach in probing CPT and Quantum Mechanics from time evolution of entangled kaon states, iii) the interest for improving on the present measurements of non-leptonic and radiative decays of kaons and eta/eta$^\prime$ mesons, iv) the contribution to understand the nature of light scalar mesons, and v) the opportunity to search for narrow di-lepton resonances suggested by recent models proposing a hidden dark-matter sector. We also report on the $e^+ e^-$ physics in the continuum with the measurements of (multi)hadronic cross sections and the study of gamma gamma processes.

hep-ex↗