We analyze the radiative decays of the the 1$P$, 1$D$, 2$S$, and 2$P$ $\Lambda_c$ and 1$D$, 2$S$, and 2$P$ $\Xi_c$ charmed baryons, which belong to the flavor anti-triplet ($\bf {\bar 3}_{\rm F}$), using the constituent quark model. We compute electromagnetic transitions from ground and $P$-wave states to ground states, as well as from second-shell states to both ground and $P$-wave final states. Electromagnetic decay widths are especially valuable for identifying resonances when multiple states share the same mass and total decay width. We give branching ratios which can confirm the assignment of the $\Xi_c(3055)$ reported by LHCb. We also give branching ratios that can support the assignment of the $\Xi_c(3080)$, and discuss the possibilities for the $\Xi_c(3080)$ to be the 1$D$ state with $J^P=5/2^{+}$ or the 2$S$ with $J^P=1/2^{+}$. For the first time, this work provides calculations of electromagnetic decays for $D_\rho$-wave states, $\rho-\lambda$ mixed configurations, and $\rho$-mode radially excited states in singly charmed baryons of the flavor anti-triplet. Both experimental and model-dependent uncertainties are taken into account throughout our analysis.

A comprehensive study of the phase structure of the two-flavor quark-meson-diquark model is presented within the nonperturbative functional renormalization group framework. The influence of mesonic fluctuations beyond the mean-field approximation is investigated, and two-point functions of the diquark fields are computed at finite real-time frequencies. Renormalization group consistency of the effective potential is ensured in order to avoid cutoff artifacts. Substantial modifications of the phase structure are found once mesonic fluctuations are included, and for sufficiently strong diquark couplings the dynamics become dominated by diquark condensation. These effects are elucidated through an analysis of the diquark pole mass and the Silver-Blaze property.

We study the CP-conserving flipped (Type-Y) Two-Higgs-Doublet Model (2HDM) in the large-$\tan\beta$ regime ($\tan\beta>30$), focusing on its implications for electroweak phase transitions (EWPTs) and LHC phenomenology. Viable parameter regions supporting a strong first-order EWPT fall into two heavy-Higgs hierarchies: (A) $m_{H^\pm}\simeq m_H<m_A$ and (B) $m_H<m_{H^\pm} \simeq m_A$, both featuring a heaviest CP-odd Higgs $A$. Scenario~A typically proceeds via one-step transitions with lower nucleation temperatures, while Scenario~B allows one-step or two-step transitions, opening the decay $A\to H^\pm W^\mp$ and yielding richer collider signatures. In all cases, nucleation conditions are satisfied, avoiding false-vacuum trapping. We assess LHC prospects through bottom-associated production with multi-$b$ final states: $pp\to bbH\to 4b$ and $pp\to bbA\to bb W^\pm H^\mp\to 4b\ell\ell\nu\nu$. The $4b$ channel offers high-statistics discovery potential, reaching signal significances $z\gtrsim 25$ at the 13 TeV LHC with 300 fb$^{-1}$ and up to $z\gtrsim 100$ at the 14 TeV HL-LHC with 3 ab$^{-1}$. The cascade channel, while experimentally more challenging, directly probes the heavy Higgs spectrum and can discriminate between EWPT scenarios. Using optimized selections with a BDT-based multivariate analysis, significances of $z \simeq 6.8$ can be achieved in favorable regions of Scenario~B at the HL-LHC. These results indicate that the HL-LHC can realistically probe the BSM Higgs sector responsible for a strong first-order EWPT and provide insight into the underlying phase transition dynamics in the flipped 2HDM.

We formulate PanScales final-state showers that account for quark masses and achieve next-to-leading logarithmic accuracy, while preserving the original accuracy of the showers for observables where the mass of the quarks is irrelevant. We validate the accuracy of the shower algorithms by performing fixed-order tests up to second order in the strong coupling constant, and all-order comparisons to (semi-)analytic resummed calculations for a series of observables, including Lund-tree shapes, non-global energy flows and Lund sub-jet multiplicities. We also include some phenomenological studies using LEP data.

We study the sensitivity of the diffuse high-energy neutrino flux observed in IceCube to new-physics effects resulting in an exponential flux attenuation along the trajectory, such as invisible neutrino decay or new interactions with the background encountered during propagation. We argue that, even though the sources and production redshifts of these astrophysical neutrinos are unknown, conservative energy-conservation arguments allow to severely constrain neutrino loss in most scenarios beyond the strongest existing bounds. By performing a fit to the High-Energy Starting Events from IceCube, we quantify the bounds and study their variation with the energy dependence of the attenuation, the assumed redshift distribution of the neutrino sources, and whether the attenuation affects neutrinos exclusively or no. We also show that including an energy-dependent attenuation at the level allowed in the fit may impact the determination of the spectral index of the diffuse flux.

Heavy spin-one particles are well-motivated new physics candidates that can have their origin in weakly coupled extensions of the Standard Model gauge group or in strongly coupled Composite Higgs models. Due to the variety of production and decay modes, heavy vector triplets are a useful benchmark for the study and comparison of future colliders. Here we perform a detailed collider analysis of a variety of $2 \to 2$ and $2 \to 3$ processes at a proposed future muon collider. We focus on decays into leptons and Standard Model gauge bosons, and find that heavy vector triplets could be probed up to masses of around $12\,$TeV for almost any (perturbative) value of the coupling. We compare the direct reach of a muon collider to the LHC and to updated projections for the HL-LHC, HE-LHC and FCC-hh, and include indirect limits from future measurements of electroweak precision observables. We find that a muon collider offers projected sensitivities that are competitive with future hadron colliders, exceeding those of the HE-LHC in the scenarios considered though not reaching the projected sensitivity of the FCC-hh.

We propose an explanation for the dark matter-baryon coincidence based on collapsing $\mathbb{Z}_N$ domain walls, which form a novel compact baryonic state: the baryoid. A baryoid has an asteroid-scale mass and up-to-nuclear-scale energy density, and can serve as a dark matter candidate. Starting from equal baryon numbers in the domains formed in the early universe, the collapse of the domain walls after the QCD phase transition leads to a baryon-number ratio of $(N-1):1$ between the false- and true-vacuum domains. Since baryons are slightly lighter in the false-vacuum domains than in the true-vacuum domain, the resulting dark matter-to-baryon energy-density ratio is naturally close to, but slightly smaller than, $(N-1):1$, or $6:1$ for $N=7$. We calculate the domain-wall dynamics and the efficiency of baryon-number trapping, derive the resulting baryoid properties, and discuss a broad set of phenomenological probes.

Millicharged particles (mCPs) are a well-motivated target for far-forward searches at the Large Hadron Collider. We identify and quantify a significant new source of these particles: secondary production in hadronic and electromagnetic showers initiated by energetic neutral particles striking the TAXN absorber. By combining Monte Carlo simulations with \texttt{Geant4}-based modeling, we show that these secondary cascades yield a substantial mCP flux that complements the primary production from the interaction point. For the proposed FORMOSA detector, this contribution can enhance the expected signal yield by approximately $50\%$ for $m_\chi \lesssim 0.1~\textrm{GeV}$. Our results demonstrate that secondary production in downstream infrastructure is an essential ingredient for realistic sensitivity projections and new-physics searches at the High-Luminosity LHC. The simulated secondary spectra are made publicly available to facilitate future forward physics studies.

We propose a phenomenological model of pseudo scalar mesons to describe charged-current weak decays of heavy-light mesons. The approach combines chiral symmetry in the light sector with heavy-quark flavor symmetry, while Cabibbo--Kobayashi--Maskawa (CKM) matrix elements are incorporated as spurions that encode explicit symmetry breaking. Restricting to charged-current interactions, we systematically organize the leading-order current-current operators at dimension six and identify the relevant operator structures governing fully-leptonic, semi-leptonic, and hadronic decays. This framework reproduces known heavy-quark scaling relations for decay constants and form factors in agreement with expectations from heavy quark effective theory, providing nontrivial consistency checks. Operators responsible for hadronic transitions are further classified into double-trace operators and single-trace operators. These single traces, interestingly, often capture several higher order corrections, non-factorizable effects etc. We check for consistencies for both single-trace and double-trace operators demanding that the resulting amplitudes should satisfy established isospin sum rules. As an application, we analyze the decay modes $B\to K + \eta_{c} / \eta^{\prime}/ \eta$. We find that these processes receive contributions from a host of non-trivial processes such as mixing between various states, non-perturbative QCD parameters such as the heavy quark condensates, non-factorizable effects, etc, apart from the straightforward perturbative $W$ exchange diagrams in the quark picture. Our set-up neatly captures all of these effects. The phenomenological model we provide here is a symmetry-guided, hadron-level description of charged-current processes and offers a complementary perspective to conventional quark-level approaches, with a natural avenue for incorporating non-factorizable effects.

Generalized Parton Distributions (GPDs) provide a comprehensive framework for describing the three-dimensional structure of the nucleon. Extracting GPDs from experimental data requires flexible and physically motivated ansatz. In this study, we introduce a new ansatz, AMA25, designed to address the limitations of the previous model, GSAMA24 (Phys. Rev. C 111 (2025) 2, 025203). We conduct a fast and efficient comparison by fitting AMA25 models and other relevant data using the iMinuit optimization package within a Jupyter Notebook environment. The AMA25 ansatz demonstrates superior fit quality, achieving a reduced $\chi^2$, while better satisfying theoretical constraints. Additionally, AMA25 exhibits enhanced stability when extrapolated to the exclusive region. Our analysis highlights the power of modern computational tools for rapid model validation and underscores the importance of innovative ansatz in advancing nucleon structure studies.

Collinear factorization and color-glass condensate (CGC) effective field theory are generally treated as separate approaches for calculating scattering amplitudes, valid in different kinematic regimes. For deep inelastic scattering at high photon virtuality and high center-of-mass energy, however, both of these approaches should be applicable. By expressing collinear parton distributions and generalized parton distributions in the shockwave approximation, we show that the resulting collinear-factorization amplitudes exactly reproduce the large-$Q^2$ expansion of CGC amplitudes for inclusive deep inelastic scattering, deeply virtual Compton scattering, and deeply virtual meson production. The matching holds directly at the amplitude level and includes both logarithmically enhanced and finite contributions. Our results establish the consistency between collinear factorization and the CGC in their common region of validity, clarify the origin of large momentum logarithms within the CGC framework, and provide a path toward combining high-energy and collinear evolution in a unified description of hadronic structure at small $x$ and large momentum scales.

In this paper, we presented an approximate analytical treatment of the Coulomb plus logarithmic potential using perturbation theory to investigate the mass spectra of bottomonium and charmonium mesons for the low-order quantum states. The derived energy equation, to first-order corrections, was employed to model the free potential parameters through fitting to experimental data of the Particle Data Group. The proposed potential successfully reproduces asymptotic freedom at short distances through one-gluon exchange interactions and quark confinement at large distances, which are the essential features of the strong interactions in Quantum chromodynamics theory. The calculated bottomonium masses exhibited excellent agreement with experimental values, yielding an absolute percentage average deviation (APAD) of 0.24%, which improves upon several previously reported theoretical results. Similarly, the vector and pseudoscalar charmonium masses were obtained with an APAD of 1.65%, demonstrating improved and comparable accuracy relative to existing competing theoretical calculations. Although our results were limited to first-order corrections to the energy spectra within the perturbation theory, the reliability of the approximation was validated by comparison with exact numerical solutions obtained using the matrix Numerov method. The small percentage errors obtained confirm the effectiveness of the phenomenological potential and perturbation approximation in describing quarkonia systems. The results suggest that the approach can be reliably extended to higher excited states.

Upcoming experiments need improved simulations of neutrino scattering. This work uses the popular GENIE event generator to test a variety of neutrino interaction models against recent MicroBooNE measurements of pionless charged-current interactions. The GENIE code can easily interchange model components, including nucleon form factor parameterizations, quasielastic cross-section calculations, treatments of the nuclear ground state and hadronic final-state interactions. Leveraging this software capability in comparisons with MicroBooNE data, the performance of some of GENIE's most theoretically sophisticated model components is evaluated and contrasted with more empirically-driven alternatives.

We present a study of the $\tau^- \to \omega\pi^-\nu_\tau$ decay in the framework of low-energy effective field theory. By analyzing the $J^{PG}$ quantum numbers of the quark currents and the $\omega\pi$ final state, we find that only the Standard Model (SM) vector interaction and the non-standard tensor interaction can contribute to this decay. We construct the resonance chiral theory Lagrangian with external tensor sources and calculate both the vector and tensor form factors, with resonance couplings determined through QCD short-distance constraints, spectral function fitting, and chiral perturbation theory matching. The new physics (NP) effect is investigated in the spectral function and forward-backward asymmetry distributions. Our results show that the spectral function is dominated by the SM, while the forward-backward asymmetry, which can only arise from a non-zero tensor interaction, provides a sensitive probe of this NP effect. Future measurements at Belle II, Tera-Z, and STCF facilities are therefore strongly motivated.

We present a complete calculation of the one-loop self-energies for all fields in the linear sigma model coupled to quarks at finite temperature and in the presence of a uniform magnetic field. The analysis consistently incorporates thermal and magnetic effects for both neutral and charged degrees of freedom, providing a unified framework valid for arbitrary values of the temperature and the field strength. The computation is performed using the Matsubara formalism to account for finite temperature effects and the Schwinger proper-time representation for charged propagators in a magnetic background. Special attention is given to loop contributions involving particles with different electric charges, for which the associated Schwinger phases do not cancel. We show that these terms can be systematically evaluated in coordinate space using the Ritus formalism, which provides the appropriate framework for treating external charged states in the presence of a magnetic background, and consistently expressed in momentum space. The resulting expressions exhibit a nontrivial interplay between thermal fluctuations and magnetic effects and allow for a clear separation between vacuum and matter contributions, providing a well-defined structure for the identification of ultraviolet divergences. Our results establish a consistent and systematic framework for the computation of thermomagnetic one-loop corrections in effective models of QCD, capturing the full interplay between thermal and magnetic effects for all dynamical degrees of freedom.

We investigate a Kapitza-inspired mechanism in which rapid oscillations in the heavy-quark interaction generate an effective short-range repulsive term in the diquark--antidiquark potential. The resulting $1/r^{4}$ contribution prevents collapse at short distances and produces a stable minimum in the effective potential. Within a diquark--antidiquark picture, we construct a modified Cornell-type potential and analyze the spectrum of heavy tetraquarks using a Gaussian variational method. We compute the binding energies, wave functions, radii, and mass spectra of charm and bottom tetraquarks, including the $X(3872)$, $T_{bb}$, and fully heavy $bb\bar{b}\bar{b}$ states. The model reproduces the mass of the $X(3872)$ and predicts a deeply bound $T_{bb}$ state consistent with lattice QCD. The fully heavy $bb\bar{b}\bar{b}$ mass also agrees with recent lattice determinations. Our results indicate that the Kapitza mechanism provides a natural and robust stabilization effect in multiquark systems and offers a unified description of molecular-like and compact tetraquark configurations.

In this article we consider a $\mathbb{Z}_2$-odd $SU(2)$ quartet with hypercharge $Y = +\frac{1}{2}$ as an extension of the Standard Model whose scalar potential which introduces three additional Higgs portal and two self-couplings. We first investigate the possibility of having Landau poles (LPs) in one-loop and Fixed Points (FPs) in two-loop $\beta$-functions of the Higgs quartic couplings. The role of portal and self-couplings with and without residual phases is extensively investigated in obtaining the Fixed Point at two-loop. The model also can provide us with $\mathbb{Z}_2$-odd neutral scalar as the possible dark matter. However not always the lightest state corresponds to the neutral states, and we look into one-loop mass correction for an enhanced dark matter parameter space. This also gives rise to interesting phenomenology of the next-to-lightest particle which can be singly charged, doubly charged or neutral scalar. We performed a detailed study of dark matter relic calculation with one-loop masses and with direct detection bounds, and found out that, unlike the minimal inert extensions of $SU(2)$ multiplets, here the dark matter mass can go beyond 15 TeV without crossing the observed relic. Finally, we summarized with a few benchmark points for future studies.

Motivated by the increasing precision of neutrino oscillation data, we study the corrections to the TM$_2$ neutrino mixing framework, emanating from $(1,2)$ sector of the charged lepton, for both the standard LMA and dark-LMA solutions. We employ the Wolfenstein parameterization of the charged-lepton mixing matrix, characterized by two additional parameters $(\lambda,\delta)$, which effectively reconciles the TM$_2$ neutrino-mixing predictions with current oscillation data. For the LMA solution, the allowed ranges are $0.1 \lesssim \lambda \lesssim 0.33$ and $\delta \in (20^\circ\!-\!90^\circ)\oplus(270^\circ\!-\!340^\circ)$, while the dark-LMA case requires $\lambda>0.24$ and $125^\circ<\delta<235^\circ$. Interestingly, for LMA case, the upper bound $\lambda \le 0.33$ is found to be dictated by the atmospheric mixing angle $\theta_{23}$. The model predicts sizeable CP violation, with $|J_{CP}|$ reaching values as large as $0.13$. We, also, analyze the effective Majorana mass parameter $m_{ee}$ relevant for neutrinoless double beta decay. The inverted hierarchy region lies within the sensitivity of future experiments for both solutions, whereas only part of the normal hierarchy region can be tested.

We show that flying focus fields can be obtained from complex conformal transformation of plane waves, and that solutions of the massless wave equation in the so-obtained fields are, correspondingly, conformal transformations of the Volkov solutions. This leads to the result that photon emission amplitudes in a totally depleting flying focus beam may be computed directly from the corresponding plane wave amplitudes by taking a simple Gaussian average over certain momentum variables. In effect, this gives a way of introducing focussing effects into strong-field QED calculations `for free'. The extension of these results to scattering amplitudes including only partial depletion is discussed and some first results presented in the anti-self-dual limit.

We calculate the next-to-next-to-leading order (NNLO) QED corrections to the $C$-odd part of the differential cross section of the $e^+e^-\to\mu^+\mu^-$ process. This part contributes to the angular and forward-backward asymmetry. Together with our earlier paper [https://doi.org/10.1007/JHEP08%282025%29118], this work completes the analytical calculation of $e^+e^-\to\mu^+\mu^-$ differential cross section at NNLO.

Optimal observables provide statistically powerful probes of small deformations from a reference theory, but in realistic collider measurements they are rarely available in compact analytic form. We show that interpretable event-level observables can be discovered by AI-driven symbolic evolution using score information from matrix-element reweighting as the statistical target. Focusing on the CP-sensitive interaction $HZ_{\mu\nu}\tilde Z^{\mu\nu}$, we study two complementary realizations of the same coupling structure: associated production $e^+e^-\to Z(\to \mu^-\mu^+)H$ and the decay channel $pp\to H\to ZZ^*\to e^-e^+\mu^-\mu^+$. The learned observables retain substantially more local Fisher information than standard angular baselines while remaining compact analytic functions. In both cases, the discovered expressions recover characteristic helicity-interference harmonics. In associated production these harmonics are supplemented by laboratory-frame asymmetry mappings, while in four-lepton decay the robust component is the angular kernel, with the mass-ratio factor serving as a bounded representative prefactor. These results recast optimal-observable design as a symbolic discovery problem and provide a transparent route to information-efficient, interpretable probes of collider interference.

We perform a systematic study of two-meson form factors of the scalar, vector, and anti-symmetric tensor types within the framework of the $U(3)$ resonance chiral theory. The complete perturbative form factors in both the strangeness-conserving and strangeness-changing channels are calculated by incorporating one-loop light-flavor pseudoscalar meson contributions and tree-level resonance exchanges. With these newly calculated chiral results, we construct the corresponding unitarized form factors by incorporating meson-meson final-state interactions. The parameter values obtained in previous meson-meson scattering studies are then exploited to predict the corresponding form factors. Different types of form factors are found to exhibit rather distinct resonance structures across channels.

$D$ meson decays into neutral kaons involve both Cabibbo-favored and doubly Cabibbo-suppressed amplitudes as well as final-state kaon mixing, providing abundant sources of CP violation. In this work, we analyze CP asymmetries in the $D\to K^0_{S,L}P$ and $D\to K^0_{S,L}V$ decays, where $P$ and $V$ denote pseudoscalar and vector mesons respectively. The formulas of the time-dependent and time-integrated CP asymmetries in these modes are derived, in which the $D^0-\overline D^0$ mixing effects and the $K^0_L$ modes are considered for the first time. The hadronic parameters that determine CP asymmetries are extracted by the global fit of branching fractions within the topological diagram approach. A significant result is that the tension between theoretical predictions and experimental data for the $K_S^0-K_L^0$ asymmetries in $D^0\to K_{S,L}^0\omega$ and $D^0\to K_{S,L}^0\phi$ modes is mitigated. The CP-violating effects arising from the interference between Cabibbo-favored and doubly Cabibbo-suppressed amplitudes with neutral kaon mixing could reach to $\mathcal{O}(10^{-3})$ order in the $D^+\to K^0_S\pi^+$, $D^+_s\to K^0_SK^+$, $D^0\to K^0_S\rho^0$, and $D^0\to K^0_S\phi$ modes. The difference between the CP asymmetries in the $D^+\to K^0_S\pi^+$ and $D^+_s\to K^0_SK^+$ modes is available on LHCb and Belle II in the near future.

Inspired by the latest BESIII measurement of the $\Lambda(1520)\to\gamma\Sigma^0$ radiative decay, we systematically study the decays $\Lambda(1520)\to\gamma\Lambda(\Sigma^0)$ within the chiral unitary approach, where the $\Lambda(1520)$ is treated as a dynamically generated resonance from meson-baryon interactions. Compared with previous chiral unitary studies, we adopt dimensional regularization for $S$-wave loop integrals to preserve gauge invariance and, for the first time, include Feynman diagrams with photon coupling to intermediate baryons. Our calculated partial decay width $\Gamma(\Lambda(1520)\to\gamma\Sigma^0)$ agrees well with the new BESIII data, whereas the predicted $\Gamma(\Lambda(1520)\to\gamma\Lambda)$ is considerably smaller than the CLAS experimental result. By comparing our results with predictions from various quark models, we discuss the internal nature of the $\Lambda(1520)$ resonance, highlight its complex component structure, and stress the need for more refined theoretical frameworks and further experimental measurements.

Neutrino oscillation experiments present anomalous results across a vast range of baselines and energies. Here we show that a 3+1 scenario in which sterile neutrinos feel a novel matter potential $V_s$ proportional to background density of ordinary or (asymmetric) dark matter is able to explain several anomalies. At low-energies ($E\lesssim$ 1 TeV) the model behaves as an effective 3-flavor NSI-like scheme among active flavors and eliminates the tension between the two LBL experiments NOvA and T2K provided that the potential is negative and the two sterile mixing angles $\theta_{14}$ and $\theta_{24}$ are non-zero. A further indication in favor of a negative non-zero potential comes from the anomalous excess of $\nu_e$-like events observed in Super-Kamiokande atmospheric neutrinos, which, in the new scenario is explained by a modification of the 3-flavor resonance at few GeV. A high energies ($E\gtrsim $ 1 TeV) the new framework reveals its 4-flavor nature and produces a resonant behavior at $E \simeq$ 10 TeV as hinted at by IceCube. We identify an irreducible 3-level dynamics generating a new resonance in the $(\nu_e, \nu_\mu)$ sector intertwined with two conventional resonances in the $(\nu_e, \nu_s$) and $(\nu_\mu, \nu_s)$ systems. The novel amplification mechanism manifests with the emergence of effective mixing angles in matter ($\theta_{12}^m$ or $\theta_{13}^m$) involving active neutrinos. The scenario requires values of $f = V_s/|V_{NC}| \sim -20 $, $\Delta m^2_{41} \sim 60 $ eV$^2$, $|U_{e4}|^2\simeq \sin^2\theta_{14} \simeq 0.01-0.03$ and $|U_{\mu4}|^2 \simeq \sin^2\theta_{24}\simeq 10^{-4}-10^{-3}$. Such a very small size of $|U_{\mu4}|^2$ eliminates the tension between IceCube and the other $\nu_\mu$ disappearance searches. The model can be directly probed by KATRIN, which is very sensitive to the electron-sterile neutrino admixture in the region of high $\Delta m^2_{41}$.

High-temperature dimensional reduction provides a systematic effective field theory framework for studying finite-temperature thermodynamics and cosmological phase transitions. While the matching of super-renormalizable operators in the resulting three-dimensional effective theories is well established, the matching of higher-dimensional operators has recently been reinvigorated. These operators become phenomenologically relevant in strong first-order phase transitions where they quantify the convergence of the high-temperature expansion. This work automates the matching of generic three-dimensional dimension-five and -six operators for arbitrary models containing scalars, fermions, and gauge fields, implemented as an extension of the Mathematica package DRalgo. We present the operator basis, the matching procedure, and explicit examples including a scalar-Yukawa model, hot QCD, and the full Standard Model up to dimension six, covering operators mixing the strong and electroweak sectors as well as parity-violating contributions. Redundant operators, gauge dependence, and the corresponding field redefinitions are discussed in detail. The code and example model files are publicly available at this https URL.

We prove that any background-inert perturbative coupling $ \lambda $ in coincident $ f(Q) $ gravity exhibits a degeneracy with the clustering amplitude $ \sigma_{80} $, when using compressed CMB distance priors. This degeneracy is, in fact, a direct materialization of a more deeper $ A_s-D_0(\lambda) $ degeneracy between the primordial amplitude $ A_s $ and the present day growth factor $ D_0(\lambda) $. We outline a consistency check scheme, applicable to models even outside the $ f(Q) $ class, by computing $ A_s $ needed to reproduce the $ \sigma_{80} $ predicted by the sampler. We perform our analysis with two dataset pipelines, based on the coupled/decoupled $ f\sigma_8(z) $ data. To ensure theoretical diversity, we include $ \Lambda $CDM and the Hybrid model in the $ f(Q) $ framework. Our results illustrate that adding the $ \lambda_0\sqrt{QQ_0} $ correction to the models inflates $ \sigma_{80} $ to unphysical values, while showing moderate evidence in favor of the said models. However, this results in an increase of $ 20\%-30\% $ in $ A_s $ in $ 1.7\sigma-2.2\sigma $ tension with Planck values. We utilize the $ 1\sigma $ $ \ln(A_s) $ constraints from Planck as priors in order to fix the artificial increase in $ \sigma_{80} $ and find that all the constrained parameters return to their baseline values. Each model is penalized by around $ 2 $ units per extra parameter. Interestingly, the $ \Lambda $CDM$ +\lambda_0+\ln(A_s) $ + SDSS DR16 combination shows a weak preference over the vanilla $ \Lambda $CDM model, validated by the values of $ \log\mathcal{Z},\;AIC,\;DIC, $ and BIC.

Autonomous language-model agents are increasingly evaluated on long-horizon tool-use tasks, but existing benchmarks rarely capture the complexity and nuance of real scientific work. To address this gap, we introduce Collider-Bench, a benchmark for evaluating whether LLM agents can reproduce experimental analyses from the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) using only public papers and open scientific software. Such analyses are often difficult to reproduce because the public toolchain only approximates the software used internally by the experimental collaborations, while the published papers inevitably omit implementation details needed for a faithful reconstruction. Agents must therefore rely on physical reasoning, domain knowledge, and trial-and-error to fill these gaps. Each task requires the agent to turn a published analysis into an executable simulation-and-selection pipeline and submit predicted collision event yields in specified signal regions. These predictions are evaluated with standard histogram metrics that provide continuous fidelity scores without a hand-written rubric. We also report the computational cost incurred by each agent per task. Finally, we evaluate the codebase and full session trace using an LLM judge to catch qualitative failure modes such as fabrications, hallucinations and duplications. We release an initial set of tasks drawn from LHC searches, together with a containerized sandbox and event simulation tools. We evaluate across a capability ladder of general purpose coding agents. Our results show that on average no agent reliably beats the physicist-in-the-loop solution.

In the presence of extended defects, familiar incoming particles can scatter into exotic outgoing states created by twist operators. We show that one possible mechanism driving these "categorical scattering" processes is the presence of localized 't Hooft anomalies on the defect's worldvolume. Defect anomalies trap non-trivial charges at junctions between the symmetry lines and the interface, opening new transmission channels that would naively appear to violate selection rules. After outlining the general mechanism, we investigate several concrete examples with defects, interfaces, and boundaries. For models of massless chiral fermions already studied in the literature, we show that the emergence of twist operators can be understood as a consequence of defect anomalies. We then introduce new massive integrable theories in which a similar phenomenon occurs, and we explicitly solve the associated scattering problem, obtaining new integrable solutions. Finally, we construct lattice spin chains with defects where similar physics is expected to arise.

With the next generation of both electromagnetic and gravitational wave observatories beginning to come online, rapid analysis methods for kilonova data are becoming increasingly important in astronomy. Traditional Bayesian parameter estimation using Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) is time-consuming and relies on explicit likelihood approximations that can break down when modeling uncertainties are significant. We develop a simulation-based inference (SBI) framework for kilonova parameter estimation using density-estimation likelihood-free inference. The framework uses a Gaussian process emulator trained on $\sim1300$ radiative transfer simulations generated with the POSSIS code. We demonstrate that SBI provides a rapid alternative to MCMC for inference with emulators or approximate likelihoods that is robust to emulator uncertainty and likelihood misspecification. On simulated data, the SBI method accurately recovers injected parameters and produces posterior predictive light curves consistent with the data, but the MCMC posterior recovery suffers from systematic bias caused by likelihood misspecification. When analyzing AT2017gfo, the SBI and MCMC methods yield similar light-curve predictions but different posterior distributions, with a subset of the MCMC posteriors piling up at prior boundaries. The likelihood in the MCMC fails to capture the non-Gaussian, correlated structure of the emulator uncertainty, but SBI learns the posterior directly from forward simulations that include the full predictive distribution. Once trained, the SBI framework generates $\sim2\times10^4$ posterior samples in seconds.

We present the first combined analysis of the statistical rate function f in superallowed beta decays with ab initio calculations and data. We focus on C10 to 10B, 14O to 14N and 26mAl to 26Mg, all of which are important channels for the precise determination of the Cabibbo-Kobayashi-Maskawa (CKM) matrix element Vud. Nuclear charge form factors are obtained by combining experimental data on nuclear charge radii and theory calculations of ratios of moments with the in-medium similarity renormalization group, while the beta decay form factors are derived from exact isospin relations. This enables a rigorous study of the nuclear shape dependence in the statistical rate function f and the quantification of its uncertainties from both experiment and theory. The calculation leads to a more precise test for the first-row CKM unitarity with reduced theoretical uncertainties. This work demonstrates a reliable strategy for combining nuclear many-body calculations with high-precision nuclear data to describe beta decays at tree level for precision tests of the Standard Model.

Ultralight primordial black holes (PBHs) provide a compelling window into early-Universe cosmology. Following our earlier work, we explore a mechanism for the formation of ultralight PBHs sourced by primordial inflationary magnetic fields, without invoking an ultra-slow-roll phase of inflation. We propose a magnetogenesis model in which large curvature perturbations are induced at small scales, leading to the efficient production of ultralight PBHs across a broad mass spectrum. We analyze the phenomenological implications of these ultralight PBHs for early-Universe cosmology, particularly during reheating. We compute the resulting stochastic gravitational wave (GW) background generated by both the electromagnetic spectrum and evaporating PBHs, which exhibits distinctive features tied to the underlying magnetogenesis model parameters. Our results demonstrate that inflationary magnetic fields can serve as a viable and testable origin for ultralight PBHs, opening new avenues for probing the interplay between inflation, magnetogenesis, PBHs, and primordial gravitational waves.

We present a comprehensive analysis of the Landau-Khalatnikov-Fradkin transformations for the charged fermion propagator in reduced quantum electrodynamics (RQED). Starting from the propagator in a reference gauge, we perform a gauge transformation to obtain its analytical expression valid to all orders in an arbitrary covariant gauge and also applicable in a nonperturbative context. This work complements and extends previous studies of quantum electrodynamics in various spacetime dimensions, for both massless and massive fermions. At the perturbative level, we expand the resulting expressions up to two-loop order for both massless and massive cases, and compare our results with those available in the literature wherever possible. We argue that the most suitable choice of the reference covariant gauge in RQED is $\xi=1/3$, as in this case the leading logarithmic contribution to the massless wave-function renormalization vanishes at one-loop order. This choice provides a direct connection between perturbation theory and the constraints imposed by multiplicative renormalizability on the massless fermion propagator. We also investigate the implications of the Landau-Khalatnikov-Fradkin transformations for the dynamically generated mass function of the fermion propagator. Finally, through numerical computation, we demonstrate that both the chiral fermion condensate and the fermion pole mass are gauge-invariant quantities.

Graph construction is an essential step in the Graph Neural Network (GNN) based tracking pipelines. The goal of the graph construction is to construct a graph that contains only the defined true edge connections between nodes (detector hits). A promising approach for the graph construction is through the Metric Learning approach, where a node representation in an embedding space is learned, and nodes are connected according to their distance in the embedding space. The loss function for the metric learning in this case is a contrastive loss encouraging the true pairs of nodes to be close to each other, and pulling away the false pairs of nodes. This approach presents a conflict of the learning objective for the hopping connections when a true edge is defined as a chain connection in a particle track. To address the conflict for this case, we propose a ``Double Metric Learning'' approach, where two node representations are learned. A directed graph can then be constructed based on the distance between the two representations from two nodes respectively. We test this idea with the ATLAS ITk detector at the HL-LHC using the ATLAS ITk simulation and show better graph construction performance particularly for particles with high transverse momentum compared to the Simple Metric Learning approach. We also show that Double Metric Learning is able to accurately predict edge direction.

Atom interferometers represent a promising approach for gravitational wave detection in the decihertz frequency band, complementary to existing light-based detectors. The South Pole offers unique advantages for such experiments: exceptionally low seismic noise, established infrastructure for large scientific projects, and a location that strengthens gravitational wave source localization through global triangulation. Here we discuss the scientific case and practical considerations for deploying a long-baseline atom interferometer at the South Pole, which has the potential to expand the global network of gravitational wave detectors while enabling precision tests of fundamental physics.

We study the impact of symmetry energy ($S$), hyperons, and dark matter (DM) on structural and oscillatory properties of neutron stars (NSs). Uncertainty from hadronic equation of state for NSs is considered with 15 relativistic mean field models having slope parameter ($L_0$) of $S$ in range $40-120$ MeV. DM admixed NSs (DMANSs) are described with feeble interaction between light DM fermions ($\chi$) with hadronic matter in the presence of hyperons via scalar ($\eta$) and vector ($\xi$) dark mediators. The masses $m_{\chi}$, $m_{\eta}$ and $m_{\xi}$ are related by self-interaction constraints from bullet cluster. DM self-interaction couplings are related to $m_{\chi}$ by relic density constraint. The DM density is taken as an exponential function of baryon density with a free parameter $\alpha$. Uncertainty from DM model is incorporated by exploring the dependence on $m_{\chi}$ and $\alpha$. Several DM search experiments have almost ruled out the existence of massive DM ($\gtrsim$ GeV). Lately, pursuit for sub-GeV DM has attracted significant attention. Therefore, we consider $m_{\chi}<$ 1 GeV and $\alpha \leq$ 0.1 such that the contribution of DM to the total mass of the DMANSs is $<10\%$. Comparing our results with various astrophysical constraints, we find that the HESS J1731-347 and GW170817 data are very important in determining the presence of light DM in NSs in moderate amount, relevant in the range $L_0\lesssim$ 58 MeV. Employing models of DMANSs that satisfy several observational data, we infer with Bayesian analysis, the likely ranges of $m_{\chi}$ and $\alpha$ are almost independent of the underlying hadronic model within 40 MeV $\lesssim$ $L_0$ $<$ 58 MeV. In the absence of DM and with the most probable values of $m_{\chi}$ and $\alpha$ obtained from the Bayesian inference, we calculate the frequencies of non-radial $f$- and $p_1$-modes oscillation of NSs/DMANSs.

I derive the regularized formula for glue scalar density (gluon condensate) in terms of Dirac spectral density [arXiv:2509.03509], and elaborate on its uses and meaning. Particular attention is given to understanding of what this new formula reveals about the relation between glue and quark scalar densities, how it relates to IR phase, how it clarifies the distinction between anomalous and spontaneous ways of breaking symmetries, and what it says about the relation between UV and IR in QCD.

A consistent non-compact axion cosmology requires a non-periodic field, an effective field theory valid sufficiently above the inflationary scale, and a small non-QCD contribution to the potential that tilts the axionic vacuum landscape in order to trigger a timely domain-wall collapse. All conditions can be met by the dilaton -- the pseudo-Nambu-Goldstone boson of spontaneously broken approximate scale invariance.

Quantum Gravity remains elusive, largely because its observable effects are suppressed by powers of the Planck scale. Direct detection of single gravitons is widely believed to be impossible. Here we propose a concrete astrophysical mechanism that may overcome this suppression. We show that superradiant axion-like-particle clouds surrounding rotating black holes can generate multimode squeezed states of gravitons containing up to $10^6$ - $10^7$ correlated quanta. Such states exhibit distinctive polarization correlations and quantum-noise signatures that could be detectable in future gravitational-wave interferometers. Observation of these signatures would constitute direct evidence for the quantum nature of gravitational radiation. Conversely, their absence can place constraints on axion-cloud lifetimes. Our approach also provides a test of General Relativity as an effective field theory.

We study Lévy-like and truncated Lévy-like flights with step probability distribution of the form $r^{-1+\nu}$ for negative, positive, and zero $\nu$, focusing on the appearance of fractal geometry characteristics in the generated point sets. Forming ensembles of such point sets with fixed multiplicity, we develop simulation techniques leading to the desired value of correlation dimension in a vast continuous interval of scales. In particular, we demonstrate the possibility to produce ensembles of data sets with a low number of points with the needed properties. Furthermore, we show that the positive $\nu$ distributions, apart from a region near the upper scale limit, show fractal behaviour that extends to infinitesimally low scales. As an example, we apply our findings to producing simulations relevant to the search for critical fluctuations, related to QCD critical endpoint, in heavy-ion collision experiments.

The possibility of laser cooling and the presence of closely spaced rovibrational doublets make polyatomic molecules an attractive platform for the $\mathcal{P}$, $\mathcal{T}$-violation searches. We study the spectrum of the lowest rovibrational state of the AcOCH$_3+$ symmetric top molecule. The electronic structure full-electron computation was performed within a relativistic coupled cluster method with double and perturbative triple excitations. The rovibrational wavefunctions are obtained using a coupled channel technique, taking into account all rovibrational effects and anharmonicities of the potential. As a result, the vibrational frequencies, as well as the values of the electric dipole moments for the rovibrational states, were computed.

A direct coupling between the inflaton and Standard Model gluons can dynamically raise the QCD confinement scale during inflation, making the axion temporarily heavy and suppressing axion isocurvature perturbations. As inflation proceeds, the confinement scale relaxes, the axion becomes light, and late-time de Sitter fluctuations can generate the observed dark matter abundance. We analyze this mechanism without specifying an inflationary potential, instead parametrizing the background by $\epsilon(N) \propto 1/N^p$, where $N$ is the number of $e$-folds before the end of inflation. The single parameter $p$ distinguishes monomial models ($p=1$), standard plateau models ($p=2$), and ultra-flat plateau or hilltop-like models ($p\ge 3$). We (analytically) show that the mechanism selects plateau-like ($p\ge 2$) inflation: monomial models generically cause the confinement scale to grow too rapidly, while plateau models keep the QCD sector under perturbative control. In the minimal scenario, reheating occurs through the same inflaton-gluon coupling, and viable axion dark matter production is obtained when deconfinement occurs after the CMB window. The early-confinement sector also shifts the scalar spectral index to larger, bluer values, opening viable parameter space for models otherwise disfavored by CMB data.

A strongly self-interacting component of asymmetric dark matter particles can form compact dark stars. The high dark matter density in these objects may allow significant dark matter annihilation into Standard Model particles, even when the portals to the visible sector are extremely weak. In this paper, we argue that compact dark stars could constitute an important source of energy injection during the cosmic dawn era in addition to that of the baryonic stars. Therefore, if dark stars annihilate into photons, the luminosity of dark stars may affect the reionization history of the Universe. We show that the evolution with the redshift of the temperature brightness of the 21-cm line could significantly deviate from the expectations of standard Cosmology, thus providing a new probe for particle dark matter.

Sufficiently strong and long-lasting first-order phase transitions can produce primordial black holes (PBHs) that contribute substantially to the dark matter abundance of the Universe, and can produce large-scale primordial magnetic fields. We study these mechanisms in a generic class of conformal $\mathrm{U(1)}^\prime$ models that also explain active neutrino oscillation data via the type-I seesaw mechanism. We find that phase transitions that occur at seesaw scales between $10^4$ GeV and $10^{11}$ GeV produce gravitational wave signals (from the dynamics of the phase transition and from the decay of cosmic string loops) at LISA/ET that can be correlated with microlensing signals of PBHs at the Roman Space Telescope, while scales near $10^{11}$ GeV can be correlated with Hawking evaporation signals at future gamma-ray telescopes. LISA can probe the entire range of PBH masses between $1\times 10^{-16}M_\odot$ and $8\times 10^{-11}M_\odot$ if PBHs fully account for the dark matter abundance. For Z' masses between 5 TeV and 100 TeV, and $\sim 3$ TeV right-handed neutrinos, helical magnetic fields can be produced with magnitudes $\sim 10^{-16}$-$10^{-13}$ G and coherence lengths $\sim 10^{-4}$-$10^{-2}$ Mpc, above current blazar lower bounds.

We present analytic expressions for the one-loop QCD helicity amplitudes contributing to top-quark pair production in association with a photon or a jet at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), evaluated through $\mathcal{O}(\epsilon^2)$ in the dimensional regularisation parameter, $\epsilon$. These amplitudes are required to construct the two-loop hard functions that enter the NNLO QCD computation. The helicity amplitudes are expressed as linear combinations of algebraically independent components of the $\epsilon$-expanded master integrals--known as pentagon function--with the corresponding rational coefficients written in terms of momentum-twistor variables. We derive differential equations for the pentagon functions and solve them numerically using the generalised power series expansion method.

We propose a novel, data-driven method for determining total charm cross sections in proton-proton collisions by extrapolating measured fiducial cross sections without assuming any particular fragmentation model. The recently observed charm fragmentation non-universality at the LHC experimentally establishes strongly increased baryon production fractions and correspondingly decreased meson production fractions compared to electron-positron collisions, with a very significant $p_T$ dependence. The novel method accounts for this non-universality and its $p_T$-dependence through a data-driven extrapolation function called ddFONLL. Applied to $D^0$ production at 5 and 13 TeV, this approach yields total charm cross sections that fully incorporate the fragmentation non-universality and increase significantly compared to the previous measurements still based on fragmentation universality. The results are consistent with NNLO QCD predictions and enable direct comparisons free from fragmentation assumptions. We use this to evaluate the sensitivity of total cross-section measurements to parton distribution functions and the charm-quark mass. An outlook is given on the potential of further expanding the use of the ddFONLL method.

A new scheme for detecting wave-like dark matter (DM) using Rydberg atoms is proposed. Recent advances in trapping and manipulating Rydberg atoms make it possible to use Rydberg atoms trapped in optical tweezer arrays for DM detection. We propose to prepare a large ensemble of Rydberg atoms and to observe the excitations between Rydberg states by the DM-induced effective electric field. A scan over DM mass is enabled with the use of the Zeeman and diamagnetic shifts of energy levels under an applied external magnetic field. Taking dark-photon DM as an example, we demonstrate that our proposed experiment can have high enough sensitivity to probe previously unexplored regions of the parameter space of dark-photon coupling strengths and masses.

In this work, a systematic way of analyzing the N Higgs Doublet Models flavor sector will be developed. We introduce a complete set of mixing matrices describing the rotation between certain suitably defined bases, akin to the Cabibbo-Kobayashi-Maskawa matrix, which describes the relation between the up-quark and down-quark mass bases. We point out the crucial importance played by the charged Higgs basis. It is also introduced for the first time a complete set of weak basis transformation invariant traces of flavor matrices for the general N doublets case. This will be important for studies of the renormalization group evolution in terms of relevant physical parameters.

Among the charged leptons, the $\tau$ electric dipole moment~($d_\tau$) is the least constrained. We show that the Im[$d_\tau$] imposes strong constraints on new physics that have yet to be discussed. Motivated in particular by the Super Tau-Charm Facility (STCF), which will provide a uniquely clean environment for precision $\tau$-physics, we study the momentum-transfer dependence of $d_\tau(q^2)$ and compare the projected sensitivities of STCF and Belle II. Our analysis shows that an axion-like coupling of the $\tau$ lepton can induce sizable real and imaginary components of the EDM. The predicted EDM values may approach the present experimental sensitivities, making them accessible to future measurements at Belle II and the STCF.

We present a leading colour computation of the double virtual contributions to top-quark pair production in association with a jet at a hadron collider at next-to-next-to-leading order in QCD. The finite remainders of the two-loop amplitudes, after subtraction of infrared and ultraviolet divergences, are extracted analytically from evaluations over finite fields by using a (potentially) overcomplete basis of special functions defined through their differential equations. We construct the colour- and spin-summed interference with the tree-level amplitudes and present a \texttt{C++} library suitable for immediate use in phenomenological studies. We present new techniques for the evaluation of the special functions through direct numerical integration of differential equations which perform well across the full physical phase space.

We present the two-loop amplitudes for a self-dual Higgs boson with up to four positive helicity gluons in the heavy top-quark limit. Because the tree amplitudes in the all-plus sector vanish, we can construct simple representations of the polylogarithmic parts of the two-loop amplitudes using four-dimensional unitarity cuts into rational one-loop and tree amplitudes. The remaining rational function ambiguity is extracted from a tensor integral reduction over finite fields. The final expressions are presented using polylogarithms up to weight two and compact rational functions of spinor-helicity products.

We derive predictions for the hadronic matrix elements of radiative semileptonic decays of beautiful hadrons within Heavy Quark Effective Theory (HQET), relevant for future measurements at Belle II and LHCb. Our study considers Lambda(b) -> Lambda(c), Lambda(*)(c1) and B -> D(*), D** transitions. The symmetries of HQET highly constrain the number of structure-dependent form factors in all cases. In the soft and sub-leading soft regions, all the form factors are fully determined in terms of non-radiative Isgur-Wise functions and the magnetic dipole moments of the heavy hadrons. The structure of higher order corrections is also briefly discussed.

The Japan Proton Accelerator Research Complex (J-PARC) currently delivers a 1 MW, 3 GeV proton beam to the Materials and Life Science Experimental Facility (MLF). Power is expected to increase to 1.3 MW, driven by the needs of Hyper-Kamiokande. As a result, the MLF presently provides the highest neutron yield of any spallation source, while potentially holding the best current and foreseeable conditions for Coherent Elastic Neutrino-Nucleus Scattering (CE$\nu$NS) experimentation. We explore this potential, using as examples detector technologies presently funded for construction and under development. We quantify their sensitivity to a rich variety of particle physics scenarios, finding that very-high-statistics CE$\nu$NS measurements with significant sensitivity to relevant scenarios are feasible at this facility within the next few years.

We study leptogenesis in the quasi-degenerate but non-resonant regime. Expanding the CP asymmetry parameter near degeneracy and imposing the conservative non-resonance condition that the mass splitting must be much greater than the right-handed neutrino decay rates $\Delta M > 100\Gamma_i$, yields the universal upper bound $\epsilon \leq 1/200$, independent of both the effective neutrino masses and the right-handed neutrino mass. We investigate vanilla and flavoured near-resonant leptogenesis and find that successful leptogenesis by right-handed neutrino decays can occur for $M \gtrsim 100~\mathrm{GeV}$ independent of washout regime, extending the viable parameter space of thermal leptogenesis down to the electroweak scale without invoking resonance. We also analyse near-resonant thermal leptogenesis during reheating and show that successful baryon asymmetry generation is compatible with reheating temperatures as low as $T_{RH}\simeq 10\rm GeV$ without relying on non-thermal production. Finally, we present a consistent framework for incorporating flavour effects in near-resonant leptogenesis during reheating. Overall, near-resonant thermal leptogenesis offers a controlled alternative regime to resonant leptogenesis, lowering the leptogenesis scale to the electroweak scale, without reliance on a disputed regulator used in resonant leptogenesis.

We formulate within Supergravity a model of induced-gravity inflation, excellently consistent with ACT DR6, inspired by the Palatini gravity. The inflaton belongs in the decomposition of a conjugate pair of Higgs superfields which lead to the spontaneous breaking of a U(1)B-L symmetry at a scale close to the range (0.102-5.85)x10^16 GeV. The inflaton field is canonically normalized thanks to a real and shift-symmetric contribution into the Kaehler potential. It also includes two separate holomorphic and antiholomorphic logarithmic terms, the argument of which can be interpreted as the coupling of the inflaton to the Ricci scalar. The attainment of inflation allows for subplanckian inflaton values and energy scales below the cut-off scale of the corresponding effective theory. Embedding the model in a B-L extension of the MSSM we show how the mu parameter can be generated and non-thermal leptogenesis can be successfully realized. An outcome of our scheme is split SUSY with gravitino mass in the range (40-60) PeV, which is consistent with the results of LHC on the Higgs boson mass.

In this paper, we construct an explicit rephasing transformation that converts an arbitrary unitary mixing matrix into the Fritzsch--Xing (FX) parametrization, which is obtained by trivializing arguments of the matrix elements in the third row and third column. We further analyze rephasing invariant structure of the FX phase $\delta_{\rm FX}$ under an approximation $U_{13}^{e} = 0$, where the 1-3 element of the diagonalization matrix of charged leptons $U^{e}$ is neglected. With an additional approximation $U_{23}^{e} = 0$, the FX phase becomes highly simplified, reducing to a sum of the neutrino-intrinsic FX phase $\delta^{\nu}_{\rm FX}$ and the contribution from the relative phase $\rho'_{1}- \rho'_{2}$ between the lighter 1-2 generations. The phase $\delta_{\rm FX}$ for finite $U_{23}^{e}$ is understood as a generalization of the compact expression. This result covers almost all perturbative calculations of CP phases for the CKM and MNS matrices with hierarchical charged fermions.

We explore the possibility of explaining dark matter through six-dimensional (6D) primordial black holes (PBHs) in a theory with two extra dimensions. Interestingly, in this scenario the fundamental energy scale is of the order of $\sim 10$ TeV, accessible by future experiments. We analyse the viability of charged and rotating 6D black holes under standard Hawking evaporation as well as the memory burden scenario. In the case of pure Hawking evaporation, only PBHs with masses $M > 10^8$ g survive to present, while the lifetime of near-extremal configurations is extended by a factor $1/\beta^{1/2}$, where the parameter $\beta$ characterizes small deviations from extremality. In the memory burden scenario evaporation is enormously suppressed, and sub-gram mass PBHs can survive to the present epoch. At future colliders such as the Future Circular Collider, these micro black holes produce characteristic high multiplicity events, $\langle N \rangle \sim 21$, with thermal spectra, enabling direct probes of the fundamental scale and the number of extra dimensions. We find that the memory burden mechanism opens a broad new mass window for light PBH dark matter, while the Kaluza-Klein mass splitting $\Delta m$ aligns with the atmospheric neutrino scale, suggesting a unified framework between Swampland constraints, cosmology, collider physics, and low energy phenomenology.

We determine the pion parton distribution functions (PDFs) from its light-front wave functions, obtained using the holographic Schrödinger equation of light-front chiral QCD combined with the 't Hooft equation in (1+1)-dimensional QCD at large $N_c$. We analyze the large-$x$ behavior of the valence PDF, $\sim (1-x)^{\beta^{\rm eff}_v}$, finding overall consistency with global analyses. These pion PDFs, together with nuclear PDFs, are then used to compute the differential cross sections up to next-to-leading order for inclusive $J/\psi$ production in pion--nucleus collisions, which show good agreement with experimental data across different energies and nuclear targets.

The Sun can efficiently capture leptophilic dark matter that scatters with free electrons. If this dark matter subsequently annihilates into leptonic states, it can produce a detectable neutrino flux. Using 10 years of Super-Kamiokande observations, we set constraints on the dark-matter/electron scattering cross-section that exceed terrestrial direct detection searches by more than an order of magnitude for dark matter masses below 100 GeV, and reach cross-sections as low as $\sim$4$\times$10$^{-41}$cm$^{-2}$.

Calculating the action and the interaction Hamiltonian at higher orders in cosmological perturbation theory is a cumbersome task. We employ the formalism of EFT of inflation in the decoupling limit for single-field ultra slow-roll (USR) inflation and obtain a non-perturbative Hamiltonian in terms of the Goldstone field $\pi$. To complete the dictionary, a non-linear relation between the curvature perturbations and $\pi$ is presented. Using these results, we compute higher-order loop corrections in USR models with a sharp transition to the attractor phase, relevant for PBHs formation. It is shown that in the idealized picture in which the transition from the USR phase to SR phase is instantaneous and sharp, the loop corrections on long CMB scales increase rapidly with the number of loops $L$ and the setup may go out of perturbative control.

We calculate the action and the interaction Hamiltonians to all orders in perturbation theory in the model of single field inflation with a transient ultra slow-roll phase. Employing the formalism of EFT of inflation, we obtain a compact non-perturbative expression for the interaction Hamiltonian in terms of the Goldstone field $\pi$ in the decoupling limit. In addition, we also present a non-linear relation between $\pi$ and the curvature perturbations to all orders in perturbation theory. These are powerful results which enable us to calculate the cosmological correlators and loop corrections to any order in perturbation theory. As a non-trivial example, we calculate the $L$-loop corrections on long CMB scale perturbations in the USR models which are used for PBHs formation. We show that the loop corrections scale like $(\Delta N {\cal P}_e L) ^L$ in which ${\cal P}_e$ is the peak of the power spectrum and $\Delta N$ is the duration of the USR phase. This indicates that the loop corrections grow quickly out of perturbative control for large values of $L$. In the conventional USR setup for PBHs formation with $\Delta N \simeq 2.5$, this happens at $L=4$.

We introduce a streamlined method for evaluating in-in loop integrals using dimensional regularization for diagrams with an arbitrary number of external legs and vertices, which complements earlier work and facilitates the extraction of the ultraviolet contributions. The method leads us to identify an apparent difficulty to renormalize with Hamiltonian counterterms within the in-in formalism. We also discuss the importance of the finite parts of loop corrections that can be distinguished from their associated counterterm contributions. As an application, we examine the one-loop primordial bispectrum in the context of the effective field theory of inflation, considering a specific set of interactions, and identifying a contribution distinguishable from its tree-level counterpart.

We propose a novel gravitational mechanism for the non-thermal production of dark matter driven by curvature-induced tachyonic instabilities after inflation. Departing from the commonly studied non-minimal couplings to gravity, our framework considers a real spectator scalar field coupled quadratically to spacetime curvature invariants. We show that the rapid reorganization of spacetime curvature at the end of inflation can dynamically render the dark matter field tachyonic, triggering a short-lived phase of spontaneous symmetry breaking and explosive particle production. As a concrete and theoretically controlled example, we focus on the Gauss-Bonnet topological invariant. By combining analytical estimates with $3+1$ classical lattice simulations in the spectator field approximation, we track the out-of-equilibrium evolution of the system and compute the resulting dark matter abundance. We find that this purely gravitational mechanism can robustly reproduce the observed dark matter relic density over a wide range of masses and inflationary scales, providing also a simple fitting function that enables a lattice-independent application of our results.

Conservation of super-horizon tensor fluctuations is crucial for connecting inflation to observations. Starting from first principles, recent works have found violations of this conservation if free-streaming radiation is produced during reheating. We show that the non-conservation is sensitive to the radiation initial state, and argue that the physical state should be affected by tensor perturbations that are already present during reheating. The deviation from super-horizon conservation is then negligible, recovering the standard result from kinetic theory. In contrast, a globally homogeneous and isotropic plasma state leads to a large suppression of tensor amplitudes. This difference between the local (physical) and global thermal equilibrium settles the discrepancy between the older and recent literature.

Sign-switching dark energy provides a novel mechanism for modifying the late-time expansion history of the Universe without invoking additional fields or finely tuned initial conditions. In this work, we investigate a class of background--level cosmological models in which the dark energy contribution changes sign at a transition redshift $z_\dagger$, producing a sharp deviation from standard $\Lambda$CDM dynamics. We confront these models with a comprehensive set of cosmological observations, including Planck 18 cosmic microwave background (CMB) measurements, DESI DR2 Baryonic Acoustic Oscillation (BAO) data and the Pantheon+ $\&$ SH0ES Type Ia supernova sample (SN). Using a full Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) analysis, we find that the sign-switching scenario significantly alleviates the Hubble tension while obtaining better results when statistically comparing with $\Lambda$CDM, as quantified by the Akaike and Bayesian information Criteria. Although the model is explored only at the background level, the improvement in the inferred Hubble constant demonstrates that sign-switching dark energy offers a promising and physically economical pathway toward resolving late-universe discrepancies.

In this work we investigate the influence of weak acceleration on the confinement-deconfinement phase transition in gluodynamics. Our study is carried out within lattice simulation in the comoving reference frame of accelerated observer which is parameterized by the Rindler coordinates. We find that finite temperature confinement-deconfinement phase transition turns into spatial crossover in the Rindler spacetime. In other words, spatially separated confinement and deconfinement phases can coexist in the Rindler spacetime within certain intervals of temperature and acceleration. We determine the position of the boundary between the phases as a function of temperature for several accelerations and find that it can be described by the Tolman-Ehrenfest law with rather good accuracy although a minor deviation takes place. Moreover, the critical temperature of the system in the weak acceleration regime is found to remain unchanged as that of the standard homogeneous gluodynamics. Our results imply that the spatial confinement-deconfinement transition might take place in the vicinity of the Schwarzschild black hole horizon.

The magnetorotational collapse of massive stars copiously emits neutrinos of all flavors, with a prominent hierarchy between the non-electron and electron flavor average energies. Relying on a three-dimensional neutrino-magnetohydrodynamic simulation of a $13 M_\odot$ progenitor, we investigate flavor conversion in matter. We find that, in addition to resonant flavor conversion of neutrinos and antineutrinos in matter, (anti)neutrinos experience chirality-flipping interactions due to their non-zero magnetic moment ($\mu \lesssim 10^{-12} \mu_B$) and large magnetic field in the source ($B \simeq 10^{15}$ G). For Majorana neutrinos, this leads to resonant flavor-changing neutrino-antineutrino mixing. The event rate expected from a Galactic collapse at current and next-generation neutrino telescopes, such as IceCube and Hyper-Kamiokande, strongly depends on the orientation of the magnetorotational collapse with respect to the observer direction and flavor conversion scenario. The event rate is expected to be larger for an observer facing head on the jet launched during the stellar collapse and peaks around $400$-$600$ ms after bounce. Our work highlights that understanding the rich phenomenology of flavor conversion in magnetorotational collapses is essential to take full advantage of the joint detection of neutrinos and gravitational waves from these sources.

We develop the discrete set of Dyson-Schwinger equations for scalar fields and solve them for some cases. We show that their solutions are Gaussian in the continuum limit as expected from the theorems of Aizenman and of Aizenman and Duminil-Copin for $d\ge 4$. Extension to lower dimensionality fails, as it should, by observing that the triviality theorems used in our proof are not applicable in such cases.

We propose that the size of the universe and its rate of expansion cannot be simultaneously specified with arbitrary precision, a quantum mechanical statement encoded in a deformed commutation relation for the scale factor. The deformation modifies the Friedmann equation by adding a geometric correction to the expansion rate, and the sign and magnitude of a single free exponent determine the cosmological behavior. When the exponent is positive, the model predicts late-time dark energy with $w > -1$, testable with current and next-generation surveys. When the exponent is sufficiently negative, the same deformation produces a non-singular classical bounce that resolves the Big Bang singularity. The model introduces no new particles or fields and preserves a scale-invariant primordial power spectrum. The deformation has a natural interpretation as a horizon-scale phenomenon, with the cosmological horizon, and not the Planck length, setting its characteristic scale. The late-universe regime is then its generic application, with the expansion history as the primary observable signature. Cosmic acceleration may be the macroscopic imprint of quantum gravity at the cosmological horizon.