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Pierre Ramond

Publications and source records attributed to Pierre Ramond.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources

Exploring the Truth and Beauty of Theory Landscapes with Machine Learning

Theoretical physicists describe nature by i) building a theory model and ii) determining the model parameters. The latter step involves the dual aspect of both fitting to the existing experimental data and satisfying abstract criteria like beauty, naturalness, etc. We use the Yukawa quark sector as a toy example to demonstrate how both of those tasks can be accomplished with machine learning techniques. We propose loss functions whose minimization results in true models that are also beautiful as measured by three different criteria - uniformity, sparsity, or symmetry.

hep-ph

Seeking Truth and Beauty in Flavor Physics with Machine Learning

The discovery process of building new theoretical physics models involves the dual aspect of both fitting to the existing experimental data and satisfying abstract theorists' criteria like beauty, naturalness, etc. We design loss functions for performing both of those tasks with machine learning techniques. We use the Yukawa quark sector as a toy example to demonstrate that the optimization of these loss functions results in true and beautiful models.

hep-ph

Nambu and the Ising Model

In 2021, to mark the occasion of 2021 was Y\^oichir\^o Nambu's birth centenary, we engaged in writing a historical/scientific description of his most incisive papers. Nambu was the humblest genius we have known, and we expected to find some of his great but forgotten insights. We found one, written in 1947: ``A Note on the Eigenvalue Problem in Crystal Statistics", where he formulates and solves the $(N\times N)$ Ising model in a $2N$-dimensional Hilbert space

hep-th

Tri-Bi-Maximal Mixing in Asymmetric Textures

At the occasion of his eighty fifth birthday, I wish to to recognize the crucial role that my advisor, Professor Ayalam Balachandran, played in enabling me to evolve from engineering to physics. So many years later, this student presents his latest efforts: the importance of asymmetry in the Yukawa matrices. We start with a purely phenomenological approach with Tri-Bi-Maximal mixing as input: it predicts the value of the CP-violating angle with the three mixing angles within one sigma of their pdf values. To ensure as much naturalness as possible, a model which starts from $SU_5$ and extends to $E_6$ is discussed, in the context of finite family groups which are subgroups $G_2$.

hep-ph

Tribimaximal Mixing in the $SU(5) \times \mathcal{T}_{13}$ Texture

We extend the recently proposed $SU(5) \times \mathcal{T}_{13}$ model for the asymmetric texture to the up-type quark and seesaw sectors. The hierarchical up-type quark masses are generated from higher-dimensional operators involving family-singlet Higgses, gauge-singlet familons, and vectorlike messengers. The complex-tribimaximal (TBM) seesaw mixing arises from the vacuum structure of a minimal number of familons, resulting in an alignment between the Yukawa and Majorana matrices of the seesaw formula. Introducing four right-handed neutrinos, normal ordering of the light neutrino masses is obtained, with $m_{ν_1} = 27.6\ \mathrm{meV}$, $m_{ν_2} = 28.9\ \mathrm{meV}$ and $m_{ν_3} = 57.8\ \mathrm{meV}$. Their sum almost saturates Planck's cosmological upper bound ($120$ $\text{meV}$). The right-handed neutrino masses are expressed in terms of two parameters for a particular choice of familon vacuum alignment. We predict the $\require{cancel}\cancel{CP}$ Jarlskog-Greenberg invariant to be $|\mathcal{J}| = 0.028$, consistent with the current PDG estimate, and Majorana invariants $|\mathcal{I}_1| = 0.106$ and $|\mathcal{I}_2| = 0.011$. A sign ambiguity in the model parameters leads to two possibilities for the invariant mass parameter $|m_{ββ}|$: $13.02$ or $25.21$ $\text{meV}$, both within an order of magnitude of the most rigorous experimental upper limit ($61$--$165$ $\text{meV}$).

hep-ph

Stitching an Asymmetric Texture with $\mathcal{T}_{13} \times \mathcal{Z}_5$ Family Symmetry

We propose $\mathcal{T}_{13} = \mathcal{Z}_{13} \rtimes \mathcal{Z}_3$ as the underlying non-Abelian discrete family symmetry of the asymmetric texture presented in arXiv:1805.10684 [hep-ph]. Its mod 13 arithmetic distinguishes each Yukawa matrix element of the texture. We construct a model of effective interactions that singles out the asymmetry and equates, without fine-tuning, the products of down-quark and charged-lepton masses at a GUT-like scale.

hep-ph

Neutrinos and Particle Physics Models

As in Greek mythology, the neutrino was born in the mind of Wolfgang Pauli to salvage a fundamental principle. Its existence met with universal skepticism by a scientific community used to infer particles from experiment. Its detection in 1956 brought particle physics acceptance; its chirality explained maximal parity violation in $β$ decay; its (apparent) masslessness led theorists to imagine new symmetries. Neutrinos are pioneers of mutli-messenger astronomy, from the Sun, from SNA1987, and now through IceCube's blazar. The discovery of neutrino masses opened a new era in particle physics aswell as unexplored windows on the universe. -Tiny neutrino masses suggest new physics at very short distances through the Seesaw. - Neutrinos and quarks, unified by gauge structure, display different mass and mixing patterns: small quark mixing angles and two large neutrino mixing angles. This difference in mass and mixings in the midst of gauge unification may be an important clue towards Yukawa unification. - Neutrino mixings provide a new source of CP-violation, and may solve the riddle of matter-antimatter asymmetry. We present a historical journey of these "enfants terribles" of particle physics and their importance in understanding our universe.

physics.hist-ph

An Asymmetric TBM Texture

We construct a texture where the Seesaw matrix is diagonalized by the TriBiMaximal (TBM) matrix with a phase. All CKM and PMNS angles are within their pdg values, and the mass relations of quarks and charged leptons extrapolated to GUT scale are satisfied, including the Gatto relation. The novel ingredient is the asymmetry of the down-quark and charged lepton Yukawa matrices. Explaining the reactor angle requires a $\require{cancel} \cancel {CP}$ phase in the TBM matrix, resulting in the Jarlskog-Greenberg invariant at $|J|=0.028$, albeit with an undetermined sign. While $SO(10)$ restrains the right-handed neutrino Majorana matrix, the neutrino masses are left undetermined.

hep-ph

Hommage a Nambu

Reminiscences of my intellectual and personal interactions with Professor Nambu, and discussion of his contributions to string theory. Switching to my own research, by expressing the string coordinates as bispinors, I suggest a kinematical framework for the interacting (2,0) theory on the light-cone by using chiral constrained "Viking" superfields.

hep-th

Neutrino masses, the $μ$-term and $\mathcal{ PSL}_2(7)$

Using an $SO(10)$-inspired form for the Dirac neutrino mass, we map the neutrino data to right-handed neutrino Majorana mass-matrix, $\mathcal M$, and investigate a special form with \emph{seesaw} tribimaximal mixing; it predicts a normal hierarchy, and the values of the light neutrino masses. It may be generated by mapping the top quark hierarchy onto the vacuum values of familon fields transforming under the family group $\mathcal{ PSL}_2(7)$. We next investigate the hypothesis that these familons play a dual role, generating a hierarchy in the supersymmetric $\mathbf μ$-mass matrix of Higgses carrying family quantum numbers. A special $\mathcal{ PSL}_2(7)$ invariant coupling produces a $μ$-matrix with a hierarchy of thirteen orders of magnitude. Only one Higgs field (per hypercharge sector) is light enough (with a $μ$-mass $\sim 10-100$ GeV) to be destabilized by SUSY soft breaking at the TeV scale, and upon spontaneous symmetry breaking, gives \emph{tree-level} masses for the heaviest family.

hep-ph

Majorana Physics Through the Cabibbo Haze

We present a model in which the Supersymmetric Standard Model is augmented by the family symmetry $\bs{\m Z_7 \rtimes \m Z_3}$. Motivated by $SO(10)$, where the charge two-thirds and neutral Dirac Yukawa matrices are related, we propose, using family symmetry, a special form for the seesaw Majorana matrix; it contains a squared correlated hierarchy, allowing it to mitigate the severe hierarchy of the quark sector. It is reproduced naturally by the invariant operators of $\bs{\m Z_7 \rtimes \m Z_3}$, with the hierarchy carried by familon fields. In addition to relating the hierarchy of the $ΔI_{\rm w}=1/2$ to the $ΔI_{\rm w}=0$ sector, it contains a Gatto-Sartori-Tonin like relation, predicts a normal hierarchy for Tri-bimaximal and Golden Ratio mixings, and gives specific values for the light neutrino masses.

hep-ph

$\mathbf{θ_{13}^{}}$ and The Flavor Ring

We present the results of a numerical search for the Dirac Yukawa matrices of the Standard Model, consistent with the quark and lepton masses and their mixing angles. We assume a diagonal up-quark matrix, natural in $\bs{\m Z_7 \rtimes \m Z_3}$, Bimaximal or Tri-bimaximal seesaw mixing, and $SU(5)$ unification to relate the down-quark and charged lepton Dirac Yukawa matrices using Georgi-Jarlskog mechanisms. The measured value of $θ_{13}$ requires an asymmetric down-quark Yukawa matrix. Satisfying the measured values of both $θ_{13}$ and the electron mass restricts the number of solutions, underlying the importance of the recent measurement of the reactor angle.

hep-ph

Complex Spinors and Unified Theories

In this paper delivered by Murray Gell-Mann at the Stony Brook Supergravity Workshop in 1979, several paths to unification are discussed, from N=8 supergravity to $SU_5$, $SO_{10}$, and $E_6$. Generalizations of $SO_{10}$ to spinor representations of larger groups are introduced. A natural mechanism for generating tiny neutrino masses is proposed in the context of $SO_{10}$, and finally, focus on $SU_3$ rather than $SU_2$ or $SO_3$ family symmetries is noted.

hep-th

On Mixing Supersymmetry and Family Symmetry Breakings

We present a toy model in which the Higgs sector fields transform as non-Abelian representations of a family symmetry group, and consider the possibility that the extra family partners of the Higgs particles act as messengers for both supersymmetry and family symmetry breakings. Although such mediation schemes generically produce family dependent soft supersymmetry breaking terms at the messenger scale, we demonstrate the existence of a focusing mechanism which may erase such hierarchies through renormalization group running.

hep-ph

The $\mathcal {OSP}(2,2|16)$ superconformal theory is free!

The SuperConformal theory in three space-time dimensions with SO(16) $R$-symmetry, 128 bosons, and 128 fermions, cannot sustain interactions. This result is obtained using both light-cone superspace techniques which rely on algebraic consistency, and covariant methods which rely on SO(16) Fierz identities which fail to produce the desired algebra.

hep-th

The Five Instructions

Five elementary lectures delivered at TASI 2011 on the Standard Model, its extensions to neutrino masses, flavor symmetries, and Grand-Unification.

hep-ph