Nikolaos Mavromatos

Supersymmetry, Cosmological Constant and Inflation: Towards a fundamental cosmic picture via "running vacuum"

On the occasion of a century from the proposal of General relativity by Ein- stein, I attempt to tackle some open issues in modern cosmology, via a toy but non-trivial model. Specifically, I would like to link together: (i) the smallness of the cosmological constant today, (ii) the evolution of the universe from an inflationary era after the big- bang till now, and (iii) local supersymmetry in the gravitational sector (supergravity) with a broken spectrum at early eras, by making use of the concept of the running vacuum in the context of a simple toy model of four-dimensional N=1 supergravity. The model is characterised by dynamically broken local supersymmetry, induced by the formation of gravitino condensates in the early universe. As I will argue, there is a Starobinsky-type inflationary era characterising the broken supersymmetry phase in this model, which is compatible with the current cosmological data, provided a given constraint is satisfied among some tree-level parameters of the model and the renormalised cosmological con- stant of the de Sitter background used in the analysis. Applying the running vacuum concept, then, to the e ective field theory at the exit of inflation, makes a smooth connec- tion (in cosmic time) with the radiation dominance epoch and subsequently with the cur- rent era of the Universe, characterised by a small (but dominant) cosmological-constant contribution to the cosmic energy density. In this approach, the smallness of the cosmo- logical constant today is attributed to the failure (due to quantum gravity non-perturbative e ects) of the aforementioned constraint.

Dilatonic black holes in higher curvature string gravity

We give analytical arguments and demonstrate numerically the existence of black hole solutions of the

Novel type of CPT violation for correlated Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen states of neutral mesons.

4D

The Physics Programme Of The MoEDAL Experiment At The LHC

Effective Superstring Action in the presence of Gauss-Bonnet quadratic curvature terms. The solutions possess non-trivial dilaton hair. The hair, however, is of ``secondarytype, in the sense that the dilaton charge is expressed in terms of the black hole mass. Our solutions are not covered by the assumptions of existing proofs of the ``no-hairtheorem. We also find some alternative solutions with singular metric behaviour, but finite energy. The absence of naked singularities in this system is pointed out.

ON QUANTUM MECHANICAL ASPECTS OF MICROTUBULES

We discuss modifications to the concept of an ``antiparticle, induced by a breakdown of the CPT symmetry at a fundamental level, realized within an extended class of quantum gravity models. The resulting loss of particle-antiparticle identity in the neutral-meson system induces a breaking of the EPR correlation imposed by Bose statistics. The latter is parametrized by a complex parameter controlling the amount of contamination by the ``wrong symmetry state. The physical consequences are studied, and novel observables of CPT-violation in

Wess-Zumino Inflation in Light of Planck

phi

Dilatonic Black Holes in Higher-Curvature String Gravity II: Linear Stability

factories are proposed.

Starobinsky-type Inflation in Dynamical Supergravity Breaking Scenarios

The MoEDAL experiment at Point 8 of the LHC ring is the seventh and newest LHC experiment. It is dedicated to the search for highly-ionizing particle avatars of physics beyond the Standard Model, extending significantly the discovery horizon of the LHC. A MoEDAL discovery would have revolutionary implications for our fundamental understanding of the Microcosm. MoEDAL is an unconventional and largely passive LHC detector comprised of the largest array of Nuclear Track Detector stacks ever deployed at an accelerator, surrounding the intersection region at Point 8 on the LHC ring. Another novel feature is the use of paramagnetic trapping volumes to capture both electrically and magnetically charged highly-ionizing particles predicted in new physics scenarios. It includes an array of TimePix pixel devices for monitoring highly-ionizing particle backgrounds. The main passive elements of the MoEDAL detector do not require a trigger system, electronic readout, or online computerized data acquisition. The aim of this paper is to give an overview of the MoEDAL physics reach, which is largely complementary to the programs of the large multipurpose LHC detectors ATLAS and CMS.

A Note on the Atiyah-singer Index Theorem for Manifolds With Totally Antisymmetric

We discuss possible quantum mechanical aspects of MicroTubules (MT), based on recent developments in quantum physics. We focus on potential mechanisms for energy-loss-free transport along the microtubules, which could be considered as realizations of Frohlichs ideas on the role of solitons for superconductivity and/or biological matter. In particular, by representing the MT arrangements as cavities, we present a novel scenario on the formation of macroscopic (or mesoscopic) quantum-coherent states, as a result of the (quantum-electromagnetic) interactions of the MT dimers with the surrounding molecules of the ordered water in the interior of the MT cylinders. Such states decohere due to dissipation through the walls of the MT. Transfer of energy without dissipation, due to such coherent modes, could occur only if the decoherence time is larger than the average time scale required for energy transfer across the cells. We present some generic order of magnitude estimates or the decoherence time in a typical model for MT dynamics. Our conclusion is that the quantum coherent states play a role in energy transfer if the dissipation through the walls of the MT cavities is fairly suppressed, corresponding to damping time scales Tr≥10-4-10-5 sec, for moderately large MT networks. We suggest specific experiments to test the above-conjectured quantum nature of the microtubular arrangements inside the cell. These experiments are similar in nature to those in atomic physics, used in the detection of the Rabi-Vacuum coupling between coherent cavity modes and atoms. Our conjecture is that a similar Rabi-Vacuum-splitting phenomenon occurs in the absorption (or emission) spectra of the MT dimers, which would constitute a manifestation of the dimer coupling with the coherent modes in the ordered-water environment (dipole quanta), which emerge due to super-radiance.

H

Abstract We discuss cosmological inflation in the minimal Wess–Zumino model with a single massive chiral supermultiplet. With suitable parameters and assuming a plausible initial condition at the start of the inflationary epoch, the model can yield scalar perturbations in the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) of the correct strength with a spectral index n s ∼ 0.96 and a tensor-to-scalar perturbation ratio r 0.1 , consistent with the Planck CMB data. We also discuss the possibility of topological inflation within the Wess–Zumino model, and the possibility of combining it with a seesaw model for neutrino masses. This would violate R -parity, but at such a low rate that the lightest supersymmetric particle would have a lifetime long enough to constitute the astrophysical cold dark matter.