arXiv subjects
Publications and source records attributed to Xinmin Zhang.
We develop an efficient method based on the linear regression algorithm to probe the cosmological CPT violation using the CMB polarisation data. We validate this method using simulated CMB data and apply it to recent CMB observations. We find that a combined data sample of BICEP1 and BOOMERanG 2003 favours a nonzero isotropic rotation angle at $2.3σ$ confidence level, ie, $Δα=-3.3 \pm1.4$ deg (68% CL) with systematics included.
The observed value of the Higgs mass indicates an instability of the Higgs scalar at large energy scales, and hence also at large field values. In the context of early universe cosmology, this is often considered to lead to problems. Here we point out that we can use the instability of the Higgs field to generate an Ekpyrotic phase of contraction. In the context of string theory it is possible that at very high energy densities extra states become massless, leading to an S-brane which leads to the transition between a contracting phase in the past and the current expanding phase. Thus, the Higgs field can be used to generate a non-singular bouncing cosmology in which the anisotropy problem of usual bouncing scenarios is mitigated.
The recently discovered 5 MeV bump highlights that the uncertainty in the reactor neutrino spectrum is far greater than some theoretical estimates. Medium baseline reactor neutrino experiments will deliver by far the most precise ever measurements of theta12. However, as a result of the bump, such a determination of theta12 using the theoretical spectrum would yield a value of sin^2(2theta12) which is more than 1% higher than the true value. We show that by using recent measurements of the reactor neutrino spectrum the precision of a measurement of theta12 at a medium baseline reactor neutrino experiment can be improved appreciably. We estimate this precision as a function of the 9Li spallation background veto efficiency and dead time.
Searching for the signal of primordial gravitational waves in the B-modes (BB) power spectrum is one of the key scientific aims of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) polarization experiments. However, this could be easily contaminated by several foreground issues, such as the thermal dust emission. In this paper we study another mechanism, the cosmic birefringence, which can be introduced by a CPT-violating interaction between CMB photons and an external scalar field. Such kind of interaction could give rise to the rotation of the linear polarization state of CMB photons, and consequently induce the CMB BB power spectrum, which could mimic the signal of primordial gravitational waves at large scales. With the recent polarization data of BICEP2 and the joint analysis data of BICEP2/Keck Array and Planck, we perform a global fitting analysis on constraining the tensor-to-scalar ratio $r$ by considering the polarization rotation angle which can be separated into a background isotropic part and a small anisotropic part. Since the data of BICEP2 and Keck Array experiments have already been corrected by using the "self-calibration" method, here we mainly focus on the effects from the anisotropies of CMB polarization rotation angle. We find that including the anisotropies in the analysis could slightly weaken the constraints on $r$, when using current CMB polarization measurements. We also simulate the mock CMB data with the BICEP3-like sensitivity. Very interestingly, we find that if the effects of the anisotropic polarization rotation angle can not be taken into account properly in the analysis, the constraints on $r$ will be dramatically biased. This implies that we need to break the degeneracy between the anisotropies of the CMB polarization rotation angle and the CMB primordial tensor perturbations, in order to measure the signal of primordial gravitational waves accurately.
At upcoming medium baseline reactor neutrino experiments the spallation 9Li background will be somewhat larger than the inverse beta decay reactor neutrino signal. We use new FLUKA simulations of spallation backgrounds to optimize a class of veto strategies and find that surprisingly the optimal veto for the mass hierarchy determination has a rejection efficiency below 90%. The unrejected background has only a modest effect on the physics goals. For example $Δχ^2$ for the hierarchy determination falls by 1.4 to 3 points depending on the muon tracking ability. The optimal veto strategy is essentially insensitive to the tracking ability, consisting of 2 meter radius, 1.1 second cylindrical vetoes of well tracked muons with showering energies above 3 to 4 GeV and 0.7 second full detector vetoes for poorly tracked muons above 15 to 18 GeV. On the other hand, as the uncertainty in theta12 will be dominated by the uncertainty in the reactor neutrino spectrum and not statistical fluctuations, the optimal rejection efficiency for the measurement of theta12 is 93% in the case of perfect tracking.
In this paper we use the current and future cosmic microwave background (CMB) experiments to test the Charge-Parity-Time Reversal (CPT) symmetry. We consider a CPT-violating interaction in the photon sector $\mathcal{L}_{\rm cs}\sim p_μA_ν\tilde{F}^{μν}$ which gives rise to a rotation of the polarization vectors of the propagating CMB photons. By combining the nine-year WMAP, BOOMERanG 2003 and BICEP1 observations, we obtain the current constraint on the isotropic rotation angle $\barα = -2.12 \pm 1.14$ ($1σ$), indicating an about $2σ$ significance of the CPT violation. Here, we particularly take the systematic errors of CMB measurements into account. Then, we study the effects of the anisotropies of the rotation angle [$Δα({\bf \hat{n}})$] on the CMB polarization power spectra in detail. Due to the small effects, the current CMB polarization data can not constrain the related parameters very well. We obtain the 95\% C.L. upper limit of the variance of the anisotropies of the rotation angle $C^α(0) < 0.035$ from all the CMB datasets. More interestingly, including the anisotropies of rotation angle could lower the best fit value of $r$ and relax the tension on the constraints of $r$ between BICEP2 and Planck. Finally, we investigate the capabilities of future Planck polarization measurements on $\barα$ and $Δα({\bf \hat{n}})$. Benefited from the high precision of Planck data, the constraints of the rotation angle can be significantly improved.
We present the results of FLUKA simulations of the propagation of cosmogenic muons in a 20 kton spherical liquid scintillator detector underneath 700 to 900 meters of rock. A showering muon is one which deposits at least 3 GeV in the detector in addition to ionization energy. We find that 20 percent of muons are showering and a further 10 percent of muon events are muon bundles of which more than one muon enters the detector. In this range the showering and bundle fractions are robust against changes in the depth and topography, thus the total shower and bundle rate for a given experiment can be obtained by combining our results with an estimate for the total muon flux. One consequence is that a straightforward adaptation of the full detector showering muon cuts used by KamLAND to JUNO or RENO 50 would yield a nearly vanishing detector efficiency.
The BICEP2 collaboration reports a detection of primordial cosmic microwave background (CMB) B-mode with a tensor-scalar ratio $r=0.20^{+0.07}_{-0.05}$ (68% C.L.). However, this result is in tension with the recent Planck limit, $r<0.11$ (95% C.L.), on constraining inflation models. In this Letter we consider an inflationary cosmology with a preceding nonsingular bounce which gives rise to observable signatures on primordial perturbations. One interesting phenomenon is that both the primordial scalar and tensor modes can have a step feature on their power spectra, which nicely cancels the tensor excess power on the CMB temperature power spectrum. By performing a global analysis, we obtain the 68% C.L. constraints on the parameters of the model from the Planck+WP and BICEP2 data together: the jump scale $\log_{10}(k_{\rm b}/{\rm Mpc}^{-1})=-2.4\pm0.2$ and the spectrum amplitude ratio of bounce-to-inflation $r_B\equiv P_{\rm m} / A_{\rm s} = 0.71\pm0.09$. Our result reveals that the bounce inflation scenario can simultaneously explain the Planck and BICEP2 observations better than the standard $Λ$CDM model, and can be verified by the future CMB polarization measurements.
The AMS-02 collaboration has just released its first result of the cosmic positron fraction $e^+/(e^-+e^+)$ with high precision up to $\sim 350$ GeV. The AMS-02 result shows the same trend with the previous PAMELA result, which requires extra electron/positron sources on top of the conventional cosmic ray background, either from astrophysical sources or from dark matter annihilation/decay. In this paper we try to figure out the nature of the extra sources by fitting to the AMS-02 $e^+/(e^-+e^+)$ data, as well as the electron and proton spectra by PAMELA and the $(e^-+e^+)$ spectrum by Fermi and HESS. We adopt the GALPROP package to calculate the propagation of the Galactic cosmic rays and the Markov Chain Monte Carlo sampler to do the fit. We find that the AMS-02 data have implied essential difference from the PAMELA data. There is {\rm tension} between the AMS-02 $e^+/(e^-+e^+)$ data and the Fermi/HESS $(e^-+e^+)$ spectrum, that the AMS-02 data requires less contribution from the extra sources than Fermi/HESS. Then we redo the fit without including the Fermi/HESS data. In this case both the pulsars and dark matter annihilation/decay can explain the AMS-02 data. The pulsar scenario has a soft inject spectrum with the power-law index $\sim 2$, while the dark matter scenario needs $τ^+τ^-$ final state with mass $\sim 600$ GeV and a boost factor $\sim 200$.
The recently released BICEP2 data detected the primordial B-mode polarization in the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) map which strongly supports for a large tensor-to-scalar ratio, and thus, is found to be in tension with the Planck experiment with no evidence of primordial gravitational waves. Such an observational tension, if confirmed by forthcoming measurements, would bring a theoretical challenge for the very early universe models. To address this issue, we in the present paper revisit a single field inflation model, which includes a modulated potential. We show that this inflation model can give rise to a sizable negative running behavior for the spectral index of primordial curvature perturbation and a large tensor-to-scalar ratio. Applying these properties, our model can nicely explain the combined Planck and BICEP2 observations. To examine the validity of analytic calculations, we numerically confront the predicted temperature and B-mode power spectra with the latest CMB observations and explicitly show that our model is consistent with the current data.
Recently, BICEP2 collaboration has released their results on the measurements of the CMB polarizations. In the framework of the $Λ$CDM with a power law form of the scalar primordial power spectrum, this new measurement on the B-mode puts a tight constraint on tensor/scalar ratio $r=0.2^{+0.07}_{-0.05}~(1σ)$, which however is in tension with the Planck limit, $r<0.11$ (95% C.L.). In this paper, we consider various extensions of the $Λ$CDM model by introducing extra cosmological parameters such as the equation state of dark energy $w$, the curvature of the universe $Ω_k$, the running of the scalar power spectrum index $α_s$, the sum of the neutrino mass $Σm_ν$, the effective number of neutrinos $N_{eff}$, the tensor power spectrum index $n_{t}$, then perform the global fit to the BICEP2, Planck and also the SN and BAO data. Our results show the cosmological parameters $α_s$ and $n_t$ are highly and directly correlated with the tensor/scalar ratio $r$. However indirectly the parameters $Ω_k$ and $N_{eff}$ are also correlated with $r$. We will in this paper give the numerical values on the parameters introduced and show explicitly how the tension between the BICEP2 and Planck is effectively alleviated by the inclusion of the parameters $Ω_k$, $α_s$, $N_{eff}$ and $n_{t}$ separately.
We propose a novel experimental setup for the determination of the leptonic CP-violating phase delta using the decay at rest (DAR) of mu+ from a single source located at distances of 10 and 30 km from two 20 kton organic liquid scintillator detectors. The mu+ are created by bombarding a target with a 9 mA beam of 800 MeV protons. With this proposal delta can be determined with a precision of about 20 (15) degrees in 6 (12) years. In contrast with the DAEdALUS project, only a single source is required and it runs with a duty factor of 100 percent. Therefore 9 mA is the maximum instanteous current, greatly reducing both the technological challenges and the costs.
A nonsingular emergent universe cosmology can be realized by a nonconventional spinor field as first developed in \cite{Cai:2012yf}. We study the mechanisms of generating scale-invariant primordial power spectrum of curvature perturbation in the frame of spinor emergent universe cosmology. Particularly, we introduce a light scalar field of which the kinetic term couples to the bilinear of the spinor field. This kinetic coupling can give rise to an effective "Hubble radius" for primordial fluctuations from the scalar field to squeeze at large length scales as well as to form a nearly scale-invariant power spectrum. We study the stability of the backreaction and constrain the forms of the coupling terms. These almost scale-independent fluctuations are able to be transferred into curvature perturbation after the epoch of emergent universe through a generalized curvaton mechanism and thus can explain cosmological observations.
The Planck collaboration has recently published maps of the Cosmic Microwave Background radiation with the highest precision. In the standard flat $Λ$CDM framework, Planck data show that the Hubble constant $H_0$ is in tension with that measured by the several direct probes on $H_0$. In this paper, we perform a global analysis from the current observational data in the general dark energy models and find that resolving this tension on $H_0$ requires the dark energy model with its equation of state (EoS) $w\neq-1$. Firstly, assuming the $w$ to be a constant, the Planck data favor $w < -1$ at about $2\,σ$ confidence level when combining with the supernovae "SNLS" compilation. And consequently the value derived on $H_0$, $H_0=71.3\pm2.0$ ${\rm km\,s^{-1}\,Mpc^{-1}}$ (68% C.L.), is consistent with that from direct $H_0$ probes. We then investigate the dark energy model with a time-evolving $w$, and obtain the 68% C.L. constraints $w_0=-0.81\pm0.19$ and $w_a=-1.9\pm1.1$ from the Planck data and the "SNLS" compilation. Current data still slightly favor the Quintom dark energy scenario with EoS across the cosmological constant boundary $w\equiv-1$.
10 years from now reactor neutrino experiments will attempt to determine which neutrino mass eigenstate is the most massive. In this letter we present the results of more than seven million detailed simulations of such experiments, studying the dependence of the probability of successfully determining the mass hierarchy upon the analysis method, the neutrino mass matrix parameters, reactor flux models, geoneutrinos and, in particular, combinations of baselines. We show that a recently reported spurious dependence of the data analysis upon the high energy tail of the reactor spectrum can be removed by using a weighted Fourier transform. We determine the optimal baselines and corresponding detector locations. For most values of the CP-violating, leptonic Dirac phase delta, a degeneracy prevents NOvA and T2K from determining either delta or the hierarchy. We determine the confidence with which a reactor experiment can determine the hierarchy, breaking the degeneracy.
We study the advantages of a second identical detector at a medium baseline reactor neutrino experiment. A major obstruction to the determination of the neutrino mass hierarchy is the detector's unknown nonlinear energy response, which even under optimistic assumptions reduces the confidence in a hierarchy determination by about 1 sigma at a single detector experiment. Various energy response models are considered at one and two detector experiments with the same total target mass. A second detector at a sufficiently different baseline eliminates this 1 sigma reduction. Considering the unknown energy response, we find the confidence in a hierarchy determination at various candidate detector locations for JUNO and RENO 50. The best site for JUNO's near detector is under ZiLuoShan, 17 km and 66 km from the Yangjiang and Taishan reactor complexes respectively. We briefly describe other advantages, including a more precise determination of theta12 and the possibility of a DAEdALUS-inspired program to measure the CP-violating phase delta using a single pion source about 10 km from one detector and 20 km from the other. Two identical detectors provide a better energy resolution than a single (larger) detector, further increasing the confidence in a hierarchy determination.
Recently, the nine-year data release of the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP9) found that the inflationary models with the scalar spectral index n_s \geq 1 are excluded at about 5σconfidence level. In this paper, we set the new limits on the scalar spectral index in different cosmological models combining the WMAP9 data with the small-scale cosmic microwave background measurement from the South Pole Telescope, baryon acoustic oscillation data, Hubble Telescope measurements of the Hubble constant, and supernovae luminosity distance data. In most of extended cosmological models, e.g. with a dark energy equation of state, the constraints on n_s do not change significantly. The Harrison-Zel'dovich-Peebles (HZ) scale invariant spectrum is still disfavored at more than 4σconfidence level. However, when considering the model with a number of relativistic species N_{eff}, we obtain the limit on the spectral index of n_s=0.980\pm0.011 (1σ), due to the strong degeneracy between n_s and N_{eff}. The HZ spectrum now is still consistent with the current data at 95% confidence level.
In the next 10 years medium baseline reactor neutrino experiments will attempt to determine the neutrino mass hierarchy and to precisely measure θ_12. Both of these determinations will be more reliable if data from identical detectors at distinct baselines are combined. While interference effects can be eliminated by choosing detector sites orthogonal to the reactor arrays, one of the greatest challenges facing a determination of the mass hierarchy is the detector's unknown energy response. By comparing peaks at similar energies at two identical detectors at distinct baselines, one eliminates any correlated dependence upon a monotonic energy response. In addition, a second detector leads to new hierarchy-dependent observables, such as the ratio of the locations of the maxima of the Fourier cosine transforms. Simultaneously, one may determine the hierarchy by comparing the χ^2 best fits of ΔM^2_32 at the two detectors using the spectra associated to both hierarchies. A second detector at a distinct baseline also breaks the degeneracy between θ_12 and the background neutrino flux from, for example, distant reactors and increases the effective target mass, which is limited by current designs to about 20 kton/detector.