arXiv subjects

Sunghoon Jung

Publications and source records attributed to Sunghoon Jung.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2025

Two-point correlators in de Sitter-prepared states with bra-ket wormholes

Motivated by the finiteness of de Sitter (dS) horizon entropy, we study how "bra-ket wormholes" modify correlation functions in gravitationally prepared states. Euclidean wormhole saddles in gravitational path integrals can generate non-factorizing contributions to correlation functions, as in replica-wormhole explanation of the Page curve and bra-ket-wormhole restoration of strong subadditivity. By defining 'time' variables and computing observables in a flat region attached to the dS boundary, we evaluate bra-ket wormhole contributions to scalar two-point functions and find late-time transitions in the dominant saddle, accompanied by the ramp-and-plateau behavior of correlations and the characteristic timescale comparable to the fast scrambling. Each observable is consistent with `complementarity', in the sense that wormhole effects are distinguishable only at late respective times. Consistencies are based upon the interplay of (i) inflationary horizon exit and re-entry, (ii) enhancement of correlations at small comoving momentum by wormhole contributions, (iii) a competition between mode counting and topological suppression that drives a transition to wormhole dominance, which naturally yields the fast scrambling timescale, and (iv) irreducible errors by cosmic variance in early CMB-like observations. To clearly interpret in terms of entropy and chaotic nature of dS, one needs a more complete mechanism of wormhole stabilization.

gr-qc↗

arXiv2025

Random matrix product state models of gravitationally prepared states

Gravitationally prepared states are quantum field theoretic states prepared by gravitational path integrals with spatial boundaries that have fixed boundary conditions for gravity but not for matter fields. They can be interpreted as quantum field theoretic states of closed universes encoding quantum gravitational effects of the past. We propose a method of modelling gravitationally prepared states in two dimensions with random matrix product states (RMPS). Such RMPS models allow us to exactly define and compute contributions of higher topologies and replica geometries in the gravitationally prepared state to all orders. We show that the bra-ket wormhole phase transition, a crucial physical property of gravitationally prepared states, is ensured if the transfer matrix of the RMPS satisfies the spectral gapping property, which we define, and define a class of models called $\mathrm{O}(k)$ models satisfying this property. A novel advantage of RMPS models is that they allow us to compute the effects of off-shell wormholes, i.e., wormhole topologies without semiclassical solutions. In particular, using RMPS models, we find that off-shell wormholes lead to nonzero long-distance correlators in gravitationally prepared states. We also define RMPS models in continuous space, and discuss implications for studying de Sitter gravitationally prepared states.

hep-th↗

arXiv2025

Probing small-scale power spectrum with gravitational-wave diffractive lensing

We develop a novel way to probe subgalactic-scale matter distribution with diffractive lensing on gravitational waves. Five-year observations from Einstein Telescope and DECIGO are expected to probe $k= 10^5\sim 10^8 \,{\rm Mpc}^{-1}$ down to $P(k) = 10^{-16} \sim 10^{-14} \,{\rm Mpc}^3$ level. These results can be interpreted in terms of primordial black holes in the range $M_{\rm PBH} \gtrsim 10^{-3}M_\odot$ down to $f_{\rm PBH} = 10^{-6}$ level, or QCD axion minihalos in the range $m_a = 10^{-3} \sim 10^{-12} \,{\rm eV}$. A key result of the paper is the approximate relation between the scale $k$ and the gravitational wave frequency $f$, derived in an ensemble of `multi-lensing' events. This relation enables direct measurement of the power spectrum at specific scales, with sensitivities characterized by model-independent kernels $δP(k)$. Additionally, we delineate the statistical properties of `multi-lensing' based on the `Fresnel number' $N_F$. When $N_F \gtrsim {\cal O}(1)$, the statistical significance can be approximately calculated by Variance of lensing effects, which is directly related to the power spectrum among other moments of matter distribution.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2024

Coexistence Test of Primordial Black Holes and Particle Dark Matter from Diffractive Lensing

If dark matter (DM) consists of primordial black holes (PBHs) and particles simultaneously, PBHs are generically embedded within particle DM halos. Such ``dressed PBHs'' (dPBHs) are subject to modified constraints compared to PBHs and can contribute to significant DM abundance in the mass range $10^{-1} - 10^2 M_\odot$. We show that diffractive lensing of chirping gravitational waves (GWs) from binary mergers can not only discover, but can also identify dPBH lenses and discriminate them from bare PBHs on the event-by-event basis, with potential to definitively establish the coexistence of subdominant PBHs and particle DM.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2022

Solar Diffraction of LIGO-Band Gravitational Waves

We show that chirping gravitational waves in the LIGO frequency band $f=1 - 5000$ Hz can be gravitationally diffracted by the Sun, due to the coincidence of its Fresnel length $r_F \propto \sqrt{1\, {\rm AU}/f}$ and the solar radius $r_\odot$. This solar diffraction is detectable through its frequency-dependent amplification of the wave, albeit with low event rates. We also advocate that solar diffraction allows probing the inner solar profile with the chirping evolution of frequencies. Along the course, we develop diffractive lensing in terms of simple convergence and shear of a lens and emphasize the relevance of high-frequency regimes including merger and ringdown phases for detection. This work not only presents an interesting opportunity with ongoing and future LIGO-band missions but also develops the diffractive lensing of long-wavelength waves in the universe. A similar phenomenon can also help discover non-relativistic wave dark matter, as studied in a sequel.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2022

Hubble selection of the weak scale from QCD quantum critical point

There is growing evidence that the small weak scale may be related to self-organized criticality. In this regard, we note that if the strange quark were lighter, the QCD phase transition could have been first order, possibly exhibiting quantum critical points at zero temperature as a function of the Higgs vacuum expectation value $v_h$ smaller than (but near) the weak scale. We show that these quantum critical points allow a dynamical selection of the observed weak scale, via quantum-dominated stochastic evolutions of the value of $v_h$ during eternal inflation. Although the values of $v_h$ in different Hubble patches are described by a probability distribution in the multiverse, inflationary quantum dynamics ensures that the peak of the distribution evolves toward critical points (self-organized criticality), driven mainly by the largest Hubble expansion rate there -- the Hubble selection of the universe. To this end, we first explore the quantum critical points of the three-flavor QCD linear sigma model, parametrized by $v_h$ at zero temperature, and we present a relaxion model for the weak scale. Among the patches that have reached reheating, it results in a sharp probability distribution of $v_h$ near the observed weak scale, which is critical not to the crossover at $v_h=0$ but to the sharp transition at ${\sim}Λ_{\rm QCD}$.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2022

Probing Higgs exotic decay at the LHC with machine learning

We study the tagging of Higgs exotic decay signals using different types of deep neural networks (DNNs), focusing on the $W^\pm h$ associated production channel followed by Higgs decaying into $n$ $b$-quarks with $n=4$, 6 and 8. All the Higgs decay products are collected into a fat-jet, to which we apply further selection using the DNNs. Three kinds of DNNs are considered, namely convolutional neural network (CNN), recursive neural network (RecNN) and particle flow network (PFN). The PFN can achieve the best performance because its structure allows enfolding more information in addition to the four-momentums of the jet constituents, such as particle ID and tracks parameters. Using the PFN as an example, we verify that it can serve as an efficient tagger even though it is trained on a different event topology with different $b$-multiplicity from the actual signal. The projected sensitivity to the branching ratio of Higgs decaying into $n$ $b$-quarks at the HL-LHC are 10\%, 3\% and 1\%, for $n=4$, 6 and 8, respectively.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2022

Space-borne atom interferometric gravitational wave detections. Part II. Dark sirens and finding the one

In this paper, we investigate the potential of dark sirens by the space-borne atom interferometric gravitational-wave detectors to probe the Hubble constant. In the mid-frequency band, the sources live a long time. The motion of a detector around the Sun as well as in Earth orbit would induce large Doppler and reorientation effects, providing a precise angular resolution. Such precise localization for the GW sources makes it possible to observe the dark sirens with only one potential host galaxy, which are dubbed "golden dark sirens". We construct the catalogs of golden dark sirens and estimate that there are around 79 and 35 golden dark sirens of binary neutron stars (BNS) and binary black holes (BBH) that would be pass the detection threshold of AEDGE in 5 years. Our results show that with 5, 10, and all 79 golden dark BNS tracked by AEDGE one can constrain $H_0$ at 5.5\%, 4.1\%, and 1.8\% precision levels. With 5, 10, and all 35 golden dark BBH one can constrain $H_0$ at 2.2\%, 1.8\%, and 1.5\% precision levels, respectively. It suggests that only 5-10 golden dark BBH by AEDGE are sufficient to arbitrate the current tension between local and high-$z$ measurements of $H_0$.

gr-qc↗

arXiv2021

Small-scale shear: Peeling off diffuse subhalos with gravitational waves

Subhalos at subgalactic scales ($M\lesssim 10^7 M_\odot$ or $k\gtrsim 10^3 \,{\rm Mpc}^{-1}$) are pristine test beds of dark matter (DM). However, they are too small, diffuse and dark to be visible, in any existing observations. In this paper, we develop a complete formalism for weak and strong diffractive lensing, which can be used to probe such subhalos with chirping gravitational waves (GWs). Also, we show that Navarro-Frenk-White(NFW) subhalos in this mass range can indeed be detected individually, albeit at a rate of ${\cal O}(10)$ or less per year at BBO and others limited by small merger rates and large required SNR $\gtrsim 1/γ(r_0) \sim 10^3$. It becomes possible as NFW scale radii $r_0$ are of the right size comparable to the GW Fresnel length $r_F$, and unlike all existing probes, their lensing is more sensitive to lighter subhalos. Remarkably, our formalism further reveals that the frequency dependence of weak lensing (which is actually the detectable effect) is due to shear $γ$ at $r_F$. Not only is it consistent with an approximate scaling invariance, but it also offers a new way to measure the mass profile at a successively smaller scale of chirping $r_F \propto f^{-1/2}$. Meanwhile, strong diffraction that produces a blurred Einstein ring has a universal frequency dependence, allowing only detections. These are further demonstrated through semianalytic discussions of power-law profiles. Our developments for a single lens can be generalized and will promote diffractive lensing to a more concrete and promising physics in probing DM and small-scale structures.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2021

Low-energy probes of small CMB amplitude in models of radiative Higgs mechanism

The small CMB amplitude $A_s \simeq 10^{-9}$ (or, small temperature fluctuation $δT/T \simeq 10^{-5}$) typically requires an unnaturally small effective coupling of an inflaton $λ_ϕ\sim 10^{-14}$. In successful models, there usually is extra suppression of the amplitude, e.g. by large-field inflaton with non-minimal coupling $ξ$, so that $λ_ϕ$ can be much larger. But $λ_ϕ$ and $ξ$ cannot be $\sim {\cal O}(1)$ simultaneously; the naturalness burden is shared between them. We show that the absence of new physics signals at TeV scale may prefer a more natural size of $ξ\lesssim {\cal O}(1-100)$ with $λ_ϕ\lesssim {\cal O}(10^{-4}-10^{-8})$, constraining larger $ξ$ with larger $λ_ϕ$ more strongly. This intriguing connection between low- and high-energy physics is made in the scenarios with $U(1)_X$ where inflaton's renormalization running also induces Coleman-Weinberg mechanism for the electroweak symmetry breaking. We particularly work out the prospects of LHC 13 and 100 TeV $pp$ colliders for probing the parameter space of the small CMB amplitude.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2021

ILC Study Questions for Snowmass 2021

To aid contributions to the Snowmass 2021 US Community Study on physics at the International Linear Collider and other proposed $e^+e^-$ colliders, we present a list of study questions that could be the basis of useful Snowmass projects. We accompany this with links to references and resources on $e^+e^-$ physics, and a description of a new software framework that we are preparing for $e^+e^-$ studies at Snowmass.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2020

Fermi-ball dark matter from a first-order phase transition

We propose a novel dark matter (DM) scenario based on a first-order phase transition in the early universe. If dark fermions acquire a huge mass gap between true and false vacua, they can barely penetrate into the new phase. Instead, they get trapped in the old phase and accumulate to form macroscopic objects, dubbed Fermi-balls. We show that Fermi-balls can explain the DM abundance in a wide range of models and parameter space, depending most crucially on the dark-fermion asymmetry and the phase transition energy scale (possible up to the Planck scale). They are stable by the balance between fermion's quantum pressure against free energy release, hence turn out to be macroscopic in mass and size. However, this scenario generally produces no detectable signals (which may explain the null results of DM searches), except for detectable gravitational waves (GWs) for electroweak scale phase transitions; although the detection of such stochastic GWs does not necessarily imply a Fermi-ball DM scenario.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2020

Higgs, top and electro-weak precision measurements at future $e^+ e^-$ colliders; a combined effective field theory analysis with renormalization mixing

This paper presents a combined analysis of the potential of a future electron-positron collider to constrain the Higgs, top and electro-weak (EW) sectors of the Standard Model Effective Field Theory (SMEFT). The leading contributions of operators involving top quarks arise mostly at one-loop suppressed order and can be captured by the renormalization group mixing with Higgs operators. We perform global fits with an extended basis of 29 parameters, including both Higgs and top operators, to the projections for the Higgs, top and electro-weak precision measurements at the International Linear Collider (ILC). The determination of the Higgs boson couplings in the 250 GeV stage of the ILC is initially severely degraded by the additional top-quark degrees of freedom, but can be nearly completely recovered by the inclusion of precise measurements of top-quark EW couplings at the LHC. The physical Higgs couplings are relatively robust, as the top mass is larger than the energy scale of EW processes. The effect of the top operators on the bounds on the Wilson coefficients is much more pronounced and may limit our ability to identify the source of deviations from the Standard Model. Robust global bounds on all Wilson coefficients are only obtained when the 500 GeV stage of the ILC is included.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2020

Probing Cosmic Strings with Gravitational-Wave Fringe

Cosmic strings are important remnants of early-Universe phase transitions. We show that they can be probed by Gravitational Waves (GWs) from compact binary mergers. If such chirping GW passes by a cosmic string, it is gravitationally lensed and left with a characteristic signal of the lensing -- the GW fringe. It is observable naturally through the frequency chirping of GWs. This allows to probe cosmic strings with small tension $Δ= 8πG μ= 10^{-6} \text{ -- } 10^{-10}$, just below the current constraint, at high-frequency LIGO-band and mid-band detectors. Although its detection rates are estimated to be small, even a single detection can be used to identify a cosmic string. Contrary to the stochastic GW produced from loop decays only in local $U(1)$ models, the GW fringe can directly probe straight strings model independently. This is also complementary to the existing probes with the strong lensing of light.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2020

Constraining the gravitational coupling of axion dark matter at LIGO

The axion-gravity Chern-Simons coupling is well motivated but is relatively weakly constrained, partly due to difficult measurements of gravity. We study the sensitivity of LIGO measurements of chirping gravitational waves (GWs) on such coupling. When the frequency of the propagating GW matches with that of the coherent oscillation of axion dark matter field, the decay of axions into gravitons can be stimulated, resonantly enhancing the GW. Such a resonance peak can be detected at LIGO as a deviation from the chirping waveform. Since all observed GWs will undergo similar resonant enhancement from the Milky-Way (MW) axion halo, LIGO O1+O2 observations can potentially provide the strongest constraint on the coupling, at least for the axion mass $m_a = 5 \times 10^{-13} - 5 \times 10^{-12}$ eV. Along the course, we also emphasize the relevance of the finite coherence of axion fields and the ansatz separating forward and backward propagations of GWs. As a result, the parity violation of the Chern-Simons coupling is not observable from chirping GWs.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2020

Study of the $hγZ$ coupling at the ILC

We study the $h γZ$ coupling, which is a loop induced coupling in the Standard Model (SM), to probe new physics. In a global fit based on the SM Effective Field Theory, measurement of the SM $h γZ$ coupling can provide a very useful constraint, in particular for the precise determination of $hZZ$ and $hWW$ couplings. At the International Linear Collider (ILC), there are two direct ways to study the $h γZ$ coupling: one is to measure the branching ratio of the $h \to γZ$ decay and the other to measure the cross section for the $e^+e^- \to h γ$ process. We have performed a full simulation study of the $e^+e^- \to h γ$ process at the 250 GeV ILC, assuming 2 ab$^{-1}$ data collected by the International Large Detector (ILD). The expected 1$σ$ bound on the effective $hγZ$ coupling ($ζ_{AZ}$) combining measurements of the cross section for $e^+e^- \to h γ$ followed by $h \to b \bar{b}$ and the $h \to γZ$ branching ratio is $-0.0015<ζ_{AZ}<0.0015$. The expected significance for the signal cross section in the fully hadronic $h \to WW^*$ channel is 0.09 $σ$ for beam polarizations of $P(e^-,e^+)=(-80\%,+30\%)$.

hep-ex↗

arXiv2020

Beyond $M_{t\bar{t}}$: learning to search for a broad $t\bar t$ resonance at the LHC

A resonance peak in the invariant mass spectrum has been the main feature of a particle at collider experiments. However, broad resonances not exhibiting such a sharp peak are generically predicted in new physics models beyond the Standard Model. Without a peak, how do we discover a broad resonance at colliders? We use machine learning technique to explore answers beyond common knowledge. We learn that, by applying deep neural network to the case of a $t\bar{t}$ resonance, the invariant mass $M_{t\bar{t}}$ is still useful, but additional information from off-resonance region, angular correlations, $p_T$, and top jet mass are also significantly important. As a result, the improved LHC sensitivities do not depend strongly on the width. The results may also imply that the additional information can be used to improve narrow-resonance searches too. Further, we also detail how we assess machine-learned information.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2020

GRB lensing parallax: Closing primordial black hole dark matter mass window

The primordial black hole (PBH) comprising full dark matter (DM) abundance is currently allowed if its mass lies between $10^{-16}M_{\odot} \lesssim M \lesssim 10^{-11} M_{\odot}$. This lightest mass range is hard to be probed by ongoing gravitational lensing observations. In this paper, we advocate that an old idea of the lensing parallax of Gamma-ray bursts (GRBs), observed simultaneously by spatially separated detectors, can probe the unconstrained mass range; and that of nearby stars can probe a heavier mass range. In addition to various good properties of GRBs, astrophysical separations achievable around us --- $r_\oplus \text{--}$ AU --- is just large enough to resolve the GRB lensing by lightest PBH DM.

astro-ph.CO↗