arXiv subjects

Yohei Ema

Publications and source records attributed to Yohei Ema.

At least 37 records · Page 2Linked to original sources

arXiv2023

Spontaneous Baryogenesis from Axions with Generic Couplings

Axion-like particles can source the baryon asymmetry of our Universe through spontaneous baryogenesis. Here we clarify that this is a generic outcome for essentially any coupling of an axion-like particle to the Standard Model, requiring only a non-zero velocity of the classical axion field while baryon or lepton number violating interactions are present in thermal bath. In particular, coupling the axions only to gluons is sufficient to generate a baryon asymmetry in the presence of electroweak sphalerons or the Weinberg operator. Deriving the transport equation for an arbitrary set of couplings of the axion-like particle, we provide a general framework in which these results can be obtained immediately. If all the operators involved are efficient, it suffices to solve an algebraic equation to obtain the final asymmetries. Otherwise one needs to solve a simple set of differential equations. This formalism clarifies some theoretical subtleties such as redundancies in the axion coupling to the Standard Model particles associated with a field rotation. We demonstrate how our formalism automatically evades potential pitfalls in the calculation of the final baryon asymmetry.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2023

Muon spin force

Current discrepancy between the measurement and the prediction of the muon anomalous magnetic moment can be resolved in the presence of a long-range force created by ordinary atoms acting on the muon spin via axial-vector and/or pseudoscalar coupling, and requiring a tiny, $\mathcal{O}(10^{-13}\,{\rm eV})$ spin energy splitting between muon state polarized in the vertical direction. We suggest that an extension of the muon spin resonance ($μ$SR) experiments can provide a definitive test of this class of models. We also derive indirect constraints on the strength of the muon spin force, by considering the muon-loop-induced interactions between nuclear spin and external directions. The limits on the muon spin force extracted from the comparison of $^{199}$Hg/$^{201}$Hg and $^{129}$Xe/$^{131}$Xe spin precession are strong for the pseudoscalar coupling, but are significantly relaxed for the axial-vector one. These limits suffer from significant model uncertainties, poorly known proton/neutron spin content of these nuclei, and therefore do not exclude the possibility of a muon spin force relevant for the muon $g-2$.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2023

Heavy Neutral Leptons from Stopped Muons and Pions

Stopped muons, which are generic in pion-at-rest experiments, can shed light on heavy neutral leptons (HNLs) in unexplored parameter spaces. If the HNL is lighter than the muon, the HNL can be produced from decays of muons and pions.The HNL will travel from the production location and decay into visible Standard Model (SM) modes, leaving signals inside downstream detectors. We find that in the case that the HNL dominantly mixes with muon neutrinos, the LSND constraint on the mixing angle squared is stronger than all the previous constraints by more than an order of magnitude. In this study, we recast the LSND measurement of the $ν-e$ scattering. Future experiments such as PIP2-BD could further improve the sensitivity, provided they can distinguish the HNL events from backgrounds induced by the SM neutrinos.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2022

Flavor-changing light bosons with accidental longevity

We consider a model with a complex scalar field that couples to $(e,μ)$ or $(μ,τ)$ within the "longevity" window: $[|m_{l_1} - m_{l_2}|, m_{l_1} + m_{l_2}]$ in which $l_1$ and $l_2$ are the two different charged leptons. Within such a mass window, even a relatively large coupling (e.g. of the size commensurate with the current accuracy/discrepancy in the muon $g-2$ experiment) leads to long lifetimes and macroscopic propagation distance between production and decay points. We propose to exploit several existing neutrino experiments and one future experiment to probe the parameter space of this model. For the $μ-e$ sector, we exploit the muonium decay branching ratio and the production and decay sequence at the LSND experiment, excluding the parametric region suggested by $g_μ-2$ anomaly. For the $τ-μ$ sector, we analyze three main production mechanisms of scalars at beam dump experiments: the Drell-Yan process, the heavy meson decay, and the muon scattering. We explore the constraints from the past CHARM and NuTeV experiments, and evaluate sensitivity for the proposed beam dump experiment, SHiP. The latter can thoroughly probe the parameter space relevant for the $g_μ- 2$ anomaly.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2022

Reevaluation of heavy-fermion-induced electron EDM at three loops

Motivated by improved limits on electric dipole moments (EDMs), we revisit the three-loop light-by-light mechanism that transmits $CP$ violation from a heavy fermion to a light one. Applying it to the electron EDM induced by EDMs of heavier flavors, we find additional contributions at the order $ m_e/m_μ$ or $m_e/m_τ$ that were missing before and that make the result 1.4 times larger. Consequently we improve bounds on the tau EDM, and update indirect limits on the muon EDM as well as charm and bottom quark color EDMs.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2022

Improved indirect limits on charm and bottom quark EDMs

We derive indirect limits on the charm and bottom quark electric dipole moments (EDMs) from paramagnetic AMO and neutron EDM experiments. The charm and bottom quark EDMs generate $CP$-odd photon-gluon operators and light quark EDMs at the $c$- and $b$-quark mass thresholds. These $CP$-odd operators induce the $CP$-odd semi-leptonic operator $C_S$ and the neutron EDM below the QCD scale that are probed by the paramagnetic and neutron EDM experiments, respectively. The bound from $C_S$ is $\vert d_c \vert < 1.3\times 10^{-20}\,e\,\mathrm{cm}$ for the charm quark and $\vert d_b \vert < 7.6\times 10^{-19}\,e\,\mathrm{cm}$ for the bottom quark, with its uncertainty estimated as 10%. The neutron EDM provides a stronger bound, $\vert d_c \vert < 6\times 10^{-22}\,e\,\mathrm{cm}$ and $\vert d_b \vert < 2\times 10^{-20}\,e\,\mathrm{cm}$, though with a larger hadronic uncertainty.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2022

Transient phenomena in the axion assisted Schwinger effect

Particle production induced by a time-dependent background is well understood as the projection of the time-evolved initial state onto a set of final states. While the asymptotic initial and final states are well defined in the usual way, the definition of particles and antiparticles at intermediate times in the presence of external fields is ambiguous. These external fields moreover induce divergences which require regularization. In this paper we clarify some subtleties in the computation of transient effects in physical quantities for fermions in a homogeneous axion background, including Schwinger production in background electromagnetic fields. The presence of the axion requires particular care as well as knowledge of the UV theory when regulating the theory and computing the vacuum contribution to the fermion energy.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2022

Scalar field couplings to quadratic curvature and decay into gravitons

Any field, even if it lives in a completely hidden sector, interacts with the visible sector at least via the gravitational interaction. In this paper, we show that a scalar field in such a hidden sector generically couples to the quadratic curvature via dimension five operators, i.e., $ϕR^2$, $ϕR^{μν} R_{μν}$, $ϕR_{μνρσ} R^{μνρσ}$, $ϕR_{μνρσ} \tilde R^{μνρσ}$, because they can emerge if there exist particles heavier than it. We derive these scalar couplings to the quadratic curvature by integrating out heavy particles in a systematic manner. Such couplings are of phenomenological interest since some of them induce the scalar decay into the graviton pair. We point out that the decay of a scalar field can produce a substantial amount of the stochastic cosmic graviton background at high frequency since the suppression scale of these operators is given by the mass of heavy particles not by the Planck scale. The resultant graviton spectrum is computed in some concrete models.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2022

Early Universe Higgs dynamics in the presence of the Higgs-inflaton and non-minimal Higgs-gravity couplings

Apparent metastability of the electroweak vacuum poses a number of cosmological questions. These concern evolution of the Higgs field to the current vacuum, and its stability during and after inflation. Higgs-inflaton and non-minimal Higgs-gravity interactions can make a crucial impact on these considerations potentially solving the problems. In this work, we allow for these couplings to be present simultaneously and study their interplay. We find that different combinations of the Higgs-inflaton and non-minimal Higgs-gravity couplings induce effective Higgs mass during and after inflation. This crucially affects the Higgs stability considerations during preheating. In particular, a wide range of the couplings leading to stable solutions becomes allowed.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2022

Improved indirect limits on muon EDM

Given current discrepancy in muon $g-2$ and future dedicated efforts to measure muon electric dipole moment (EDM) $d_μ$, we assess the indirect constraints imposed on $d_μ$ by the EDM measurements performed with heavy atoms and molecules. We notice that the dominant muon EDM effect arises via the muon-loop induced "light-by-light" $CP$-odd amplitude $\propto{\bf B}{\bf E}^3$, and in the vicinity of a large nucleus the corresponding parameter of expansion can be significant, $eE_{\rm nucl}/m_μ^2 \sim 0.04$. We compute the $d_μ$-induced Schiff moment of the $^{199}$Hg nucleus, and the linear combination of $d_e$ and semileptonic $C_S$ operator (dominant in this case) that determine the $CP$-odd effects in ThO molecule. The results, $d_μ(^{199}{\rm Hg}) < 6\times 10^{-20}e$cm and $d_μ({\rm ThO}) < 2\times 10^{-20}e$cm, constitute approximately three- and nine-fold improvements over the limits on $d_μ$ extracted from the BNL muon beam experiment.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2022

Standard Model prediction for paramagnetic EDMs

Standard Model $CP$ violation associated with the phase of the Cabibbo-Kobayashi-Maskawa quark mixing matrix is known to give small answers for the EDM observables. Moreover, predictions for the EDMs of neutrons and diamagnetic atoms suffer from considerable uncertainties. We point out that the $CP$-violating observables associated with the electron spin (paramagnetic EDMs) are dominated by the combination of the electroweak penguin diagrams and $ΔI =1/2$ weak transitions in the baryon sector, and are calculable within chiral perturbation theory. The predicted size of the semileptonic operator $C_S$ is $7\times 10^{-16}$ which corresponds to the equivalent electron EDM $d_e^{\rm eq} = 1.0 \times 10^{-35}e\,{\rm cm}$. While still far from the current observational limits, this result is three orders of magnitude larger than previously believed.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2021

Preheating from target space curvature and unitarity violation: Analysis in field space

We study particle production and unitarity violation caused by a curved target space right after inflation. We use the inflaton field value instead of cosmic time as the time variable, and derive a semiclassical formula for the spectrum of produced particles. We then derive a simple condition for unitarity violation during preheating, which we confirm by our semiclassical method and numerical solution. This condition depends not only on the target space curvature but also on the height of the inflaton potential at the end of inflation. This condition tells us, for instance, that unitarity is violated in running kinetic inflation and Higgs inflation, while unitarity is conserved in $α$-attractor inflation and Higgs-Palatini inflation.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2021

Neutrino experiments probe hadrophilic light dark matter

We use Super-K data to place new strong limits on interactions of sub-GeV Dark Matter (DM) with nuclei, that rely on the DM flux inevitably induced by cosmic-ray upscatterings. We derive analogous sensitivities at Hyper-K and DUNE and compare them with others, e.g. at JUNO. Using simplified models, we find that our proposal tests genuinely new parameter space, allowed both by theoretical consistency and by other direct detection experiments, cosmology, meson decays and our recast of monojet. Our results thus motivate and shape a new physics case for any large volume detector sensitive to nuclear recoils.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2021

Dark matter models for the 511 keV galactic line predict keV electron recoils on Earth

We propose models of Dark Matter that account for the 511 keV photon emission from the Galactic Centre, compatibly with experimental constraints and theoretical consistency, and where the relic abundance is achieved via p-wave annihilations or, in inelastic models, via co-annihilations. Due to the Dark Matter component that is inevitably upscattered by the Sun, these models generically predict keV electron recoils at detectors on Earth, and could naturally explain the excess recently reported by the XENON1T collaboration. The very small number of free parameters make these ideas testable by detectors like XENONnT and Panda-X, by accelerators like NA64 and LDMX, and by cosmological surveys like the Simons observatory and CMB-S4. As a byproduct of our study, we recast NA64 limits on invisibly decaying dark photons to other particles.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2021

Axion assisted Schwinger effect

We point out an enhancement of the pair production rate of charged fermions in a strong electric field in the presence of time dependent classical axion-like background field, which we call axion assisted Schwinger effect. While the standard Schwinger production rate is proportional to $\exp(-π(m^2+p_T^2 )/E)$, with $m$ and $p_T$ denoting the fermion mass and its momentum transverse to the electric field $E$, the axion assisted Schwinger effect can be enhanced at large momenta to $\exp(-πm^2/E)$. The origin of this enhancement is a coupling between the fermion spin and its momentum, induced by the axion velocity. As a non-trivial validation of our result, we show its invariance under field redefinitions associated with a chiral rotation and successfully reproduce the chiral anomaly equation in the presence of helical electric and magnetic fields. We comment on implications of this result for axion cosmology, focussing on axion inflation and axion dark matter detection.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2021

Renormalization Group Equations of Higgs-$R^2$ Inflation

We derive one- and two-loop renormalization group equations (RGEs) of Higgs-$R^2$ inflation. This model has a non-minimal coupling between the Higgs and the Ricci scalar and a Ricci scalar squared term on top of the standard model. The RGEs derived in this paper are valid as long as the energy scale of interest (in the Einstein frame) is below the Planck scale. We also discuss implications to the inflationary predictions and the electroweak vacuum metastability.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2020

Higgs Inflation as Nonlinear Sigma Model and Scalaron as its $σ$-meson

We point out that a model with scalar fields with a large nonminimal coupling to the Ricci scalar, such as Higgs inflation, can be regarded as a nonlinear sigma model (NLSM). With the inclusion of not only the scalar fields but also the conformal mode of the metric, our definition of the target space of the NLSM is invariant under the frame transformation. We show that the $σ$-meson that linearizes this NLSM to be a linear sigma model (LSM) corresponds to the scalaron, the degree of freedom associated to the $R^2$ term in the Jordan frame. We demonstrate that quantum corrections inevitably induce this $σ$-meson in the large-$N$ limit, thus providing a frame independent picture for the emergence of the scalaron. The resultant LSM only involves renormalizable interactions and hence its perturbative unitarity holds up to the Planck scale unless it hits a Landau pole, which is in agreement with the renormalizability of quadratic gravity.

hep-ph↗

arXiv2020

High-frequency Graviton from Inflaton Oscillation

We point out that there is a high-frequency tail of the stochastic inflationary gravitational wave background that scales as $f^{-1/2}$ with frequency $f$. This contribution comes from the graviton vacuum fluctuation amplified by the inflaton coherent oscillation during the reheating stage. It contains information on inflaton properties such as the inflaton mass as well as the thermal history of the early Universe.

astro-ph.CO↗