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S. Dimopoulos

Publications and source records attributed to S. Dimopoulos.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources

Stopping Gluinos

Long lived gluinos are the trademark of split supersymmetry. They form R-hadrons that, when charged, efficiently lose energy in matter via ionisation. Independent of R-spectroscopy and initial hadronization, a fraction of R-hadrons become charged while traversing a detector. This results in a large number of stopped gluinos at present and future detectors. For a 300 GeV gluino, $10^6$ will stop each year in LHC detectors, while several hundred stop in detectors during Run II at the Tevatron. The subsequent decays of stopped gluinos produce distinctive depositions of energy in calorimeters with no activity in either the tracker or the muon chamber. The gluino lifetime can be determined by looking for events where both gluinos stop and subsequently decay.

hep-ph

Splitting Supersymmetry in String Theory

We point out that type I string theory in the presence of internal magnetic fields provides a concrete realization of split supersymmetry. To lowest order, gauginos are massless while squarks and sleptons are superheavy. We build such realistic U(3)xU(2)xU(1) models on stacks of magnetized D9-branes. Though not unified into a simple group, these theories preserve the successful supersymmetric relation of gauge couplings, as they start out with equal SU(3) and SU(2) couplings and the correct initial sin^2θ_W at the compactification scale of M_{GUT}\simeq 2x10^{16} GeV, and they have the minimal low-energy particle content of split supersymmetry. We also propose a mechanism in which the gauginos and higgsinos are further protected by a discrete R-symmetry against gravitational corrections, as the gravitino gets an invariant Dirac mass by pairing with a member of a Kaluza-Klein tower of spin-3/2 particles. In addition to the models proposed here, split supersymmetry offers novel strategies for realistic model-building. So, TeV-scale string models previously dismissed because of rapid proton decay, or incorrect sin^2θ_W, or because there were no unused dimensions into which to dilute the strength of gravity, can now be reconsidered as candidates for realistic split theories with string scale near M_{GUT}, as long as the gauginos and higgsinos remain light.

hep-th

Aspects of Split Supersymmetry

We explore some fundamental differences in the phenomenology, cosmology and model building of Split Supersymmetry compared with traditional low-scale supersymmetry. We show how the mass spectrum of Split Supersymmetry naturally emerges from theories where the dominant source of supersymmetry breaking preserves an $R$ symmetry, characterize the class of theories where the unavoidable $R$-breaking by gravity can be neglected, and point out a new possibility, where supersymmetry breaking is directly communicated at tree level to the visible sector via renormalizable interactions. Next, we discuss possible low-energy signals for Split Supersymmetry. The absence of new light scalars removes all the phenomenological difficulties of low-energy supersymmetry, associated with one-loop flavor and CP violating effects. However, the electric dipole moments of leptons and quarks do arise at two loops, and are automatically at the level of present limits with no need for small phases, making them accessible to several ongoing new-generation experiments. We also study proton decay in the context of Split Supersymmetry, and point out scenarios where the dimension-six induced decays may be observable. Finally, we show that the novel spectrum of Split Supersymmetry opens up new possibilities for the generation of dark matter, as the decays of ultraheavy gravitinos in the early universe typically increase the abundance of the lightest neutralino above its usual freeze-out value. This allows for lighter gauginos and Higgsinos, more accessible both to the LHC and to dark-matter detection experiments.

hep-ph

The Beyond the Standard Model Working Group: Summary Report

Report of the "Beyond the Standard Model" working group for the Workshop `Physics at TeV Colliders', Les Houches, France, 21 May - 1 June 2001. It consists of 18 separate parts: 1. Preface; 2. Theoretical Discussion; 3. Numerical Calculation of the mSUGRA and Higgs Spectrum; 4. Theoretical Uncertainties in Sparticle Mass Predictions; 5. High Mass Supersymmetry with High Energy Hadron Colliders; 6. SUSY with Heavy Scalars at LHC; 7. Inclusive Study of MSSM in CMS; 8. Establishing a No-Lose Theorem for NMSSM Higgs Boson Discovery at the LHC; 9. Effects of Supersymmetric Phases on Higgs Production in Association with Squark Pairs in the Minimal Supersymmetric Standard Model; 10. Study of the Lepton Flavour Violating Decays of Charged Fermions in SUSY GUTs; 11. Interactions of the Goldstino Supermultiplet with Standard Model Fields; 12. Attempts at Explaining the NuTeV Observation of Di-Muon Events; 13. Kaluza-Klein States of the Standard Model Gauge Bosons: Constraints From High Energy Experiments; 14. Kaluza-Klein Excitations of Gauge Bosons in the ATLAS Detector; 15. Search for the Randall Sundrum Radion Using the ATLAS Detector; 16. Radion Mixing Effects on the Properties of the Standard Model Higgs Boson; 17. Probing Universal Extra Dimensions at Present and Future Colliders; 18. Black Hole Production at Future Colliders.

hep-ph

Small Numbers from Tunneling Between Brane Throats

Generic classes of string compactifications include ``brane throats'' emanating from the compact dimensions and separated by effective potential barriers raised by the background gravitational fields. The interaction of observers inside different throats occurs via tunnelling and is consequently weak. This provides a new mechanism for generating small numbers in Nature. We apply it to the hierarchy problem, where supersymmetry breaking near the unification scale causes TeV sparticle masses inside the standard model throat. We also design naturally long-lived cold dark matter which decays within a Hubble time to the approximate conformal matter of a long throat. This may soften structure formation at galactic scales and raises the possibility that much of the dark matter of the universe is conformal matter. Finally, the tunnelling rate shows that the coupling between throats, mediated by bulk modes, is stronger than a naive application of holography suggests.

hep-th

Generating Small Numbers by Tunneling in Multi-Throat Compactifications

A generic F-theory compactification containing many D3 branes develops multiple brane throats. The interaction of observers residing inside different throats involves tunneling suppression and, as a result, is very weak. This suggests a new mechanism for generating small numbers in Nature. One application is to the hierarchy problem: large supersymmetry breaking near the unification scale inside a shallow throat causes TeV-scale SUSY-breaking inside the standard-model throat. Another application, inspired by nuclear-decay, is in designing naturally long-lived particles: a cold dark matter particle residing near the standard model brane decays to an approximate CFT-state of a longer throat within a Hubble time. This suggests that most of the mass of the universe today could consist of CFT-matter and may soften structure formation at sub-galactic scales. The tunneling calculation demonstrates that the coupling between two throats is dominated by higher dimensional modes and consequently is much larger than a naive application of holography might suggest.

hep-th

Soft Masses in Theories with Supersymmetry Breaking by TeV-Compactification

We study the sparticle spectroscopy and electroweak breaking of theories where supersymmetry is broken by compactification (Scherk-Schwarz mechanism) at a TeV. The evolution of the soft terms above the compactification scale and the resulting sparticle spectrum are very different from those of the usual MSSM and gauge mediated theories. This is traced to the softness of the Scherk-Schwarz mechanism which leads to scalar sparticle masses that are only logarithmically sensitive to the cutoff starting at two loops. As a result, squarks and sleptons are naturally an order of magnitude lighter than gauginos. In addition, the mechanism is very predictive and the sparticle spectrum depends on just two new parameters. A significant advantage of this mechanism relative to gauge mediation is that a Higgsino mass $μ\sim M_susy$ is automatically generated when supersymmetry is broken. Our analysis applies equally well to theories where the cutoff is near a TeV or $M_{Pl}$ or some intermediate scale. We also use these observations to show how we may obtain compactification radii which are hierarchically larger than the fundamental cutoff scale.

hep-ph

New Dimensions at a Millimeter to a Fermi and Superstrings at a TeV

Recently, a new framework for solving the hierarchy problem has been proposed which does not rely on low energy supersymmetry or technicolor. The gravitational and gauge interactions unite at the electroweak scale, and the observed weakness of gravity at long distances is due the existence of large new spatial dimensions. In this letter, we show that this framework can be embedded in string theory. These models have a perturbative description in the context of type I string theory. The gravitational sector consists of closed strings propagating in the higher-dimensional bulk, while ordinary matter consists of open strings living on D3-branes. This scenario raises the exciting possibility that the LHC and NLC will experimentally study both ordinary aspects of string physics such as the production of narrow Regge-excitations of all standard model particles, as well more exotic phenomena involving strong gravity such as the production of black holes. The new dimensions can be probed by events with large missing energy carried off by gravitons escaping into the bulk. We finally discuss some important issues of model building, such as proton stability, gauge coupling unification and supersymmetry breaking.

hep-ph

Millimetre-Range Forces in Superstring Theories with Weak-Scale Compactification

We show that theories in which supersymmetry is broken via Scherk-Schwarz compactification at the weak scale, possess at least one scalar particle with Compton wavelength in the millimetre range, which mediates a force with strength 1/3 of gravity. Such forces are going to be explored in upcoming experiments using micro-electromechanical systems or cantilever technology. We also present a simple way of understanding some decoupling aspects of these theories by analogy with finite-temperature field theory.

hep-ph

Multi-Messenger Theories of Gauge-Mediated Supersymmetry Breaking

We study gauge-mediated theories containing several messengers with the most general SU(5)-invariant mass and supersymmetry-breaking parameters. We show that these theories are predictive, containing only two relevant parameters more than the minimal gauge-mediated model. Hypercharge D-terms can contribute significantly to the right-handed charged sleptons and bring them closer in mass to the left-handed sleptons. The messenger masses must be invariant under either SU(5) or a ``messenger parity" to avoid spontaneous breaking of charge conservation.

hep-ph

Dark Matter in Theories of Gauge-Mediated Supersymmetry Breaking

In gauge-mediated theories supersymmetry breaking originates in a strongly interacting sector and is communicated to the ordinary sparticles via SU(3)$\times$SU(2)$\times$U(1) carrying ``messenger'' particles. Stable baryons of the strongly interacting supersymmetry breaking sector naturally weigh $\sim$ 100 TeV and are viable cold dark matter candidates. They interact too weakly to be observed in dark matter detectors. The lightest messenger particle is a viable cold dark matter candidate under particular assumptions. It weighs less than 5 TeV, has zero spin and is easily observable in dark matter detectors.

hep-ph

Stability Bounds on Flavor-Violating Trilinear Soft Terms in the MSSM

The stability of the standard vacuum imposes constraints on flavor violating trilinear soft terms which are stronger than the laboratory bounds coming from the absence of neutral flavor violations (FCNC). Furthermore, contrary to the FCNC bounds, these constraints persist even if the scale of supersymmetry breaking is arbitrarily large.

hep-ph

Macroscopic Forces from Supersymmetry

We argue that theories in which supersymmetry breaking originates at low energies often contain scalar particles that mediate coherent gravitational strength forces at distances less than a cm. We estimate the strength and range of these forces in several cases. Present limits on such forces are inadequate. However new techniques, such as those based on small cryogenic mechanical oscillators, may improve the present limits by ten orders of magnitude or discover new forces as weak as 1 \% of gravity at distances down to 40 microns.

hep-ph

Naturalness Constraints in Supersymmetric Theories with Non-Universal Soft Terms

In the absence of universality the naturalness upper limits on supersymmetric particle masses increase significantly. The superpartners of the two light generations can be much heavier than the weak scale without extreme fine-tunings; they can weigh up to about 900 GeV --- or even up to 5 TeV, if SU(5) universality is invoked. This supresses sparticle-mediated rare processes and consequently ameliorates the problem of supersymmetric flavor violations. On the other hand, even without universality, the gluino and stop remain below about 400 GeV while the charginos and neutralinos are likely to be accessible at LEP2.

hep-ph

Disoriented and Plastic Soft Terms: A Dynamical Solution to the Problem of Supersymmetric Flavor Violations

We postulate that the orientation of the soft supersymmetry-breaking terms in flavor space is not fixed by tree level physics at the Planck scale; it is a dynamical variable which depends on fields that have no tree level potential. These fields can be thought of as either moduli or as the Nambu-Goldstone bosons of the spontaneously broken flavor symmetry which is non-linearly realized by the soft terms. We show that the soft terms align with the quark and lepton Yukawa couplings, just as spins align with an external magnetic field. As a result, the soft terms conserve individual lepton numbers and do not cause large flavor or CP violations. The vacuum adjusts so as to allow large sparticle splittings to naturally coexist with flavor conservation. Consequently, the resulting phenomenology is different from that of minimal supersymmetric theories. We also propose theories in which the shape of the soft terms in flavor space is a dynamical variable which depends on fields that have no tree level potential. This dynamically leads to partial degeneracy among sparticles and further supression of flavor violations. The ideas of this paper suggest a connection between the space of moduli and the spontaneously broken flavor group.

hep-ph

Fermion Masses, Mixing Angles and Supersymmetric SO(10) Unification

We reanalyse the problem of fermion masses in supersymmetric SO(10) grand unified models. In the minimal model, both low energy Higgs doublets belong to the same {\bf{10}} representation of SO(10) implying the unification not only of the gauge but also of the third generation Yukawa couplings. These models predict large values of $\tanβ\sim 50$. In this paper we study the effects of departing from the minimal conditions in order to see if we can find models with a reduced value of $\tanβ$. In order to maintain predictability, however, we try to do this with the addition of only one new parameter. We still assume that the fermion masses arise from interactions of the spinor representations with a single ${\bf 10}$ representation, but this ${\bf 10}$ now only contains a part of the two light Higgs doublets. This enables us to introduce one new parameter $ω=λ_b/λ_t$. For values of $ω\ll 1$ we can in principle reduce the value of $\tanβ$. In fact, $ω$ is an overall factor which multiplies the down quark and charged lepton Yukawa matrices. Thus the theory is still highly constrained. We show that the first generation quark masses and the CP-violation parameter $ε_K$ yield strong constraints on the phenomenologically allowed models. In the end, we find that large values of $\tanβ$ are still preferred.

hep-ph

Electric dipole moments as a test of supersymmetric unification

In a class of supersymmetric grand unified theories, including those based on the gauge group $SO(10)$, there are new contributions to the electric dipole moments of the neutron and electron, which arise as a heavy top quark effect. These contributions arise from CKM-like phases, not from phases of the supersymmetry breaking operators, and can be reliably computed in terms of the parameters of the weak scale supersymmetric theory. For the expected ranges of these parameters, the electric dipole moments of the neutron and the electron are predicted to be close to present experimental limits.

hep-ph