Angular Correlation Research Articles

Unraveling the CMB lack-of-correlation anomaly with the cosmological gravitational wave background

Since the very first observations, the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) has revealed on large-scales unexpected features known as anomalies, which challenge the standard Λ cold dark matter (ΛCDM) cosmological model. One such anomaly is the “lack-of-correlation”, where the measured two-point angular correlation function of CMB temperature anisotropies is compatible with zero, differently from the predictions of the standard model. This anomaly could indicate a deviation from the standard model, unknown systematics, or simply a rare realization of the model itself. In this study, we explore the possibility that the lack-of-correlation anomaly is a consequence of living in a rare realization of the standard model, by leveraging the potential information provided by the cosmological gravitational wave background (CGWB) detectable by future gravitational wave (GW) interferometers. We analyze both constrained and unconstrained realizations of the CGWB to investigate the extent of information that GWs can offer. To quantify the impact of the CGWB on the lack-of-correlation anomaly, we employ established estimators and introduce a new estimator that addresses the “look-elsewhere” effect. Additionally, we consider three different maximum multipoles, denoted as ℓ max, to account for the anticipated capabilities of future GW detectors (ℓ max = 4, 6, 10). Summarizing our findings for the case of ℓ max = 4, we identify the angular range [63∘ - 180∘] as the region where future observations of the CGWB maximize the probability of rejecting the standard model. Furthermore, we calculate the expected significance of this observation, demonstrating that 98.81% (81.67%) of the constrained GW realizations enhance the current significance of the anomaly when considering the full-sky (masked) Planck SMICA map as our CMB sky.

Toward Robust Detections of Nanohertz Gravitational Waves

The recent observation of a common red-noise process in pulsar timing arrays (PTAs) suggests that the detection of nanohertz gravitational waves might be around the corner. However, in order to confidently attribute this red process to gravitational waves, one must observe the Hellings–Downs curve—the telltale angular correlation function associated with a gravitational-wave background. This effort is complicated by the complex modeling of pulsar noise. Without proper care, misspecified noise models can lead to false-positive detections. Background estimation using “quasi-resampling” methods such as sky scrambles and phase shifts, which use the data to characterize the noise, are therefore important tools for assessing significance. We investigate the ability of current PTA experiments to estimate their background with “quasi-independent” scrambles—characterized by a statistical “match” below the fiducial value: ∣M∣ < 0.1. We show that sky scrambling is affected by “saturation” after quasi-independent realizations; subsequent scrambles are no longer quasi-independent. We show that phase scrambling saturates after quasi-independent realizations. With so few independent scrambles, it is difficult to make reliable statements about the ≳5σ tail of the null distribution of the detection statistic. We sketch out various methods by which one may increase the number of independent scrambles. We also consider an alternative approach, wherein one reframes the background estimation problem so that the significance is calculated using statistically dependent scrambles. The resulting p-value is in principle well defined, but may be susceptible to failure if assumptions about the data are incorrect.

Probing the Bioinorganic Chemistry of Cu(I) with 111Ag Perturbed Angular Correlation (PAC) Spectroscopy

The two most common oxidation states of copper in biochemistry are Cu(II) and Cu(I), and while Cu(II) lends itself to spectroscopic interrogation, Cu(I) is silent in most techniques. Ag(I) and Cu(I) are both closed-shell d10 monovalent ions, and to some extent share ligand and coordination geometry preferences. Therefore, Ag(I) may be applied to explore Cu(I) binding sites in biomolecules. Here, we review applications of 111Ag perturbed angular correlation (PAC) of γ-ray spectroscopy aimed to elucidate the chemistry of Cu(I) in biological systems. Examples span from small blue copper proteins such as plastocyanin and azurin (electron transport) over hemocyanin (oxygen transport) to CueR and BxmR (metal-ion-sensing proteins). Finally, possible future applications are discussed. 111Ag is a radionuclide which undergoes β-decay to 111Cd, and it is a γ-γ cascade of the 111Cd daughter nucleus, which is used in PAC measurements. 111Ag PAC spectroscopy may provide information on the coordination environment of Ag(I) and on the structural relaxation occurring upon the essentially instantaneous change from Ag(I) to Cd(II).

Search for supersymmetry in final states with a single electron or muon using angular correlations and heavy-object identification in proton-proton collisions at s\\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \\usepackage{amsmath} \\usepackage{wasysym} \\usepackage{amsfonts} \\usepackage{amssymb} \\usepackage{amsbsy} \\usepackage{mathrsfs} \\usepackage{upgreek} \\setlength{\\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \\begin{document}$$ \\sqrt{s} $$\\end{document} = 13 TeV

A search for supersymmetry is presented in events with a single charged lepton, electron or muon, and multiple hadronic jets. The data correspond to an integrated luminosity of 138 fb−1 of proton-proton collisions at a center-of-mass energy of 13 TeV, recorded by the CMS experiment at the CERN LHC. The search targets gluino pair production, where the gluinos decay into final states with the lightest supersymmetric particle (LSP) and either a top quark-antiquark (tt¯\\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \\usepackage{amsmath} \\usepackage{wasysym} \\usepackage{amsfonts} \\usepackage{amssymb} \\usepackage{amsbsy} \\usepackage{mathrsfs} \\usepackage{upgreek} \\setlength{\\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \\begin{document}$$ \ extrm{t}\\overline{\ extrm{t}} $$\\end{document}) pair, or a light-flavor quark-antiquark (qq¯\\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \\usepackage{amsmath} \\usepackage{wasysym} \\usepackage{amsfonts} \\usepackage{amssymb} \\usepackage{amsbsy} \\usepackage{mathrsfs} \\usepackage{upgreek} \\setlength{\\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \\begin{document}$$ \ extrm{q}\\overline{\ extrm{q}} $$\\end{document}) pair and a virtual or on-shell W boson. The main backgrounds, tt¯\\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \\usepackage{amsmath} \\usepackage{wasysym} \\usepackage{amsfonts} \\usepackage{amssymb} \\usepackage{amsbsy} \\usepackage{mathrsfs} \\usepackage{upgreek} \\setlength{\\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \\begin{document}$$ \ extrm{t}\\overline{\ extrm{t}} $$\\end{document} pair and W+jets production, are suppressed by requirements on the azimuthal angle between the momenta of the lepton and of its reconstructed parent W boson candidate, and by top quark and W boson identification based on a machine-learning technique. The number of observed events is consistent with the expectations from standard model processes. Limits are evaluated on supersymmetric particle masses in the context of two simplified models of gluino pair production. Exclusions for gluino masses reach up to 2120 (2050) GeV at 95% confidence level for a model with gluino decay to a tt¯\\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \\usepackage{amsmath} \\usepackage{wasysym} \\usepackage{amsfonts} \\usepackage{amssymb} \\usepackage{amsbsy} \\usepackage{mathrsfs} \\usepackage{upgreek} \\setlength{\\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \\begin{document}$$ \ extrm{t}\\overline{\ extrm{t}} $$\\end{document} pair (a qq¯\\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \\usepackage{amsmath} \\usepackage{wasysym} \\usepackage{amsfonts} \\usepackage{amssymb} \\usepackage{amsbsy} \\usepackage{mathrsfs} \\usepackage{upgreek} \\setlength{\\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \\begin{document}$$ \ extrm{q}\\overline{\ extrm{q}} $$\\end{document} pair and a W boson) and the LSP. For the same models, limits on the mass of the LSP reach up to 1250 (1070) GeV.

Subaru High-z Exploration of Low-luminosity Quasars (SHELLQs). XVIII. The Dark Matter Halo Mass of Quasars at z ∼ 6

We present, for the first time, dark matter halo (DMH) mass measurement of quasars at z ∼ 6 based on a clustering analysis of 107 quasars. Spectroscopically identified quasars are homogeneously extracted from the Hyper Suprime-Cam Strategic Survey Program wide layer over 891 deg2. We evaluate the clustering strength by three different autocorrelation functions: projected correlation function, angular correlation function, and redshift–space correlation function. The DMH mass of quasars at z ∼ 6 is evaluated as with the bias parameter b = 20.8 ± 8.7 by the projected correlation function. The other two estimators agree with these values; though, each uncertainty is large. The DMH mass of quasars is found to be nearly constant ∼1012.5 h −1 M ⊙ throughout cosmic time, suggesting that there is a characteristic DMH mass where quasars are always activated. As a result, quasars appear in the most massive halos at z ∼ 6, but in less extreme halos thereafter. The DMH mass does not appear to exceed the upper limit of 1013 h −1 M ⊙, which suggests that most quasars reside in DMHs with across most of the cosmic time. Our results supporting a significant increasing bias with redshift are consistent with the bias evolution model with inefficient active galactic nucleus feedback at z ∼ 6. The duty cycle (f duty) is estimated as 0.019 ± 0.008 by assuming that DMHs in some mass interval can host a quasar. The average stellar mass is evaluated from stellar-to-halo mass ratio as , which is found to be consistent with [C ii] observational results.

Capturing Statistical Isotropy Violation with Generalized Isotropic Angular Correlation Functions of Cosmic Microwave Background Anisotropy

The exquisitely measured maps of fluctuations in the cosmic microwave background (CMB) present the possibility of systematically testing the principle of statistical isotropy of the Universe. A systematic approach based on strong mathematical formulation allows any nonstatistical isotropic (nSI) feature to be traced to the nature of physical effects or observational artifacts. Bipolar spherical harmonics (BipoSH) representation has emerged as an overarching general formalism for quantifying the departures from statistical isotropy for a field on a 2D sphere. We adopt a little-known reduction of the BipoSH functions, dubbed minimal harmonics in the original paper by Manakov et al. We demonstrate that this reduction technique of BipoSH leads to a new generalized set of isotropic angular correlation functions referred to here as minimal BipoSH functions that are observable quantifications of nSI features in a sky map. This paper presents a novel observable quantification of deviation from statistical isotropy in terms of generalized angular correlation functions that are compact and complementary to the BipoSH spectra that generalize the angular power spectrum of CMB fluctuations.

νDoBe — A Python tool for neutrinoless double beta decay

We present νDoBe, a Python tool for the computation of neutrinoless double beta decay (0νββ) rates in terms of lepton-number-violating operators in the Standard Model Effective Field Theory (SMEFT). The tool can be used for automated calculations of 0νββ rates, electron spectra and angular correlations for all isotopes of experimental interest, for lepton-number-violating operators up to and including dimension 9. The tool takes care of renormalization-group running to lower energies and provides the matching to the low-energy effective field theory and, at lower scales, to a chiral effective field theory description of 0νββ rates. The user can specify different sets of nuclear matrix elements from various many-body methods and hadronic low-energy constants. The tool can be used to quickly generate analytical and numerical expressions for 0νββ rates and to generate a large variety of plots. In this work, we provide examples of possible use along with a detailed code documentation. The code can be accessed through:GitHub: https://github.com/OScholer/nudobeOnline User-Interface: https://oscholer-nudobe-streamlit-4foz22.streamlit.app/

The formation of supermassive black holes from Population III.1 seeds. II. Evolution to the local universe

ABSTRACT We present predictions for cosmic evolution of populations of supermassive black holes (SMBHs) forming from Population III.1 seeds, i.e. early, metal-free dark matter minihaloes forming far from other sources, parametrized by isolation distance, diso. Extending previous work that explored this scenario to z = 10, we follow evolution of a $(60\, {\rm {Mpc}})^3$ volume to z = 0. We focus on evolution of SMBH comoving number densities, halo occupation fractions, angular clustering, and 3D clustering, exploring a range of diso constrained by observed local number densities of SMBHs. We also compute synthetic projected observational fields, in particular, a case comparable to the Hubble Ultra Deep Field. We compare Pop III.1 seeding to a simple halo mass threshold model, commonly adopted in cosmological simulations of galaxy formation. Major predictions of the Pop III.1 model include that all SMBHs form by z ∼ 25, after which their comoving number densities are near-constant, with low merger rates. Occupation fractions evolve to concentrate SMBHs in the most massive haloes by z = 0, but with rare cases of SMBHs in haloes down to $\sim 10^8\, M_\odot$. The diso scale at epoch of formation, e.g. $100\,$kpc-proper at z ∼ 30, i.e. $\sim 3\,$Mpc-comoving, is imprinted in the SMBH two-point angular correlation function, remaining discernible as a low-amplitude feature to z ∼ 1. The SMBH 3D two-point correlation function at z = 0 also shows lower amplitude compared to equivalently massive haloes. We discuss prospects for testing these predictions with observational surveys of SMBH populations.

Energy−Angular Correlations at Inelastic Scattering of Tagged Neutrons by Carbon, Nitrogen, and Oxygen Nuclei

Energy−Angular Correlations at Inelastic Scattering of Tagged Neutrons by Carbon, Nitrogen, and Oxygen Nuclei

Azimuthal Correlations within Exclusive Dijets with Large Momentum Transfer in Photon-Lead Collisions.

The structure of nucleons is multidimensional and depends on the transverse momenta, spatial geometry, and polarization of the constituent partons. Such a structure can be studied using high-energy photons produced in ultraperipheral heavy-ion collisions. The first measurement of the azimuthal angular correlations of exclusively produced events with two jets in photon-lead interactions at large momentum transfer is presented, a process that is considered to be sensitive to the underlying nuclear gluon polarization. This study uses a data sample of ultraperipheral lead-lead collisions at sqrt[s_{NN}]=5.02 TeV, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 0.38 nb^{-1}, collected with the CMS experiment at the LHC. The measured second harmonic of the correlation between the sum and difference of the two jet transverse momentum vectors is found to be positive, and rising, as the dijet transverse momentum increases. A well-tuned model that has been successful at describing a wide range of proton scattering data from the HERA experiments fails to describe the observed correlations, suggesting the presence of gluon polarization effects.

Mapping the milky way’s stellar halo with 2D data

ABSTRACT We propose a new method for measuring the spatial density distribution of the stellar halo of the Milky Way. Our method is based on a pairwise statistic of the distribution of stars in the sky, the angular two-point correlation function (ATPCF). The ATPCF utilizes two-dimensional data of stars only and is therefore immune to the large uncertainties in the determination of distances to stars. We test our method using mock stellar data coming from various models including the single power-law (SPL) and the broken power-law (BPL) density profiles. We also test the influence of axisymmetric flattening factors using both constant and varying values. We find that the ATPCF is a powerful tool for recovering the spatial distributions of the stellar haloes in our models. We apply our method to observational data from the type ab RR Lyrae catalogue in the Catalina Survey Data Release 1. In the 3-parameter BPL model, we find that $s_{1}=2.46_{-0.20}^{+0.18}, s_{2}=3.99_{-1.33}^{+0.75}$, and $r_{0}=31.11_{-5.88}^{+7.61}$, which are in good agreement with previous results. We also find that introducing an extra parameter, the radially varying flattening factor, greatly improves our ability to model accurately the observed data distribution. This implies perhaps that the stellar halo of the Milky Way should be regarded as oblate.

Angular correlations on causally-coherent inflationary horizons

We develop a model for correlations of cosmic microwave background (CMB) anisotropy on the largest angular scales, based on standard causal geometrical relationships in slow-roll inflation. Unlike standard models based on quantized field modes, it describes perturbations with nonlocal directional coherence on spherical boundaries of causal diamonds. Causal constraints reduce the number of independent degrees of freedom, impose new angular symmetries, and eliminate cosmic variance for purely angular 2-point correlations. Distortions of causal structure from vacuum fluctuations are modeled as gravitational memory from randomly oriented outgoing and incoming gravitational null shocks, with nonlocally coherent directional displacements on curved surfaces of causal diamonds formed by standard inflationary horizons. The angular distribution is determined by axially symmetric shock displacements on circular intersections of the comoving sphere that represents the CMB photosphere with other inflationary horizons—those centered on it, and those that pass through an observer’s world line. Displacements on thin spheres at the end of inflation have a unique angular power spectrum that approximates the standard expectation on small angular scales, but differs substantially at large angular scales due to horizon curvature. For a thin sphere, the model predicts a universal angular correlation function with an exact ‘causal shadow’ symmetry, , and significant large-angle parity violation. We apply a rank statistic to compare models with WMAP and Planck satellite data, and find that a causally-coherent model with no shape parameters or cosmic variance agrees with the measured better than a large fraction () of standard model realizations. Model-independent tests of holographic causal symmetries are proposed.

Stability of a two-electron system under pressure confinement: structural and quantum information theoretical analysis

The stability of a two-electron Zee system trapped inside an impenetrable spherical cavity is analyzed using an explicitly correlated multi-exponent Hylleraas-type basis set in the framework of the Ritz variational method. The wave function is considered to be consistent with Dirichlet’s boundary condition. Four different values are considered, where denotes the critical nuclear charge beyond which the system is embedded in a discrete positive energy continuum due to the impenetrable nature of the cavity. The energy contribution due to the total correlation (in the presence of both radial and angular correlation) effect, the radial correlation limit, and the angular correlation limit are also studied in detail. The thermodynamic pressure felt by the two-electron Zee system inside the cavity is estimated, and a formula replicating the behavior between the pressure and volume of the cavity is deduced by a fitting procedure. Different geometrical properties, e.g. radial moments (, , , , ; p = ), angular moments (, ), and related important physical quantities, are determined. The variation of Kirkwood and Buckingham polarizabilities w.r.t. the pressure felt by the two-electron Zee system is analyzed. A one-electron radial density is estimated for each pair of (), which has been employed to generate the electrostatic potential as well as different information theoretical measures like Shannon entropy, Fisher entropy, Rényi entropy, Tsallis entropy, and Onicescu informational energy. The chosen information theoretical measures have been found to be sensitive tools for describing changes in the electronic structure due to spatial confinement. An interesting interplay between the electronic and nuclear contribution to the classical electrostatic potential is observed, leading to a shift in the position of its characteristic minimum due to compression. Wherever possible, a comparison is made in order to ascertain the high accuracy of our numerical results. The procedure of analytic evaluation of the integrals needed to estimate the atomic properties under consideration is discussed in detail.

Direct Measurement of the Internal Pressure of Ultrafine Bubbles Using Radioactive Nuclei

Direct Measurement of the Internal Pressure of Ultrafine Bubbles Using Radioactive Nuclei

Measurement of the differential hbox {t}overline{hbox {t}} production cross section as a function of the jet mass and extraction of the top quark mass in hadronic decays of boosted top quarks

A measurement of the jet mass distribution in hadronic decays of Lorentz-boosted top quarks is presented. The measurement is performed in the lepton + jets channel of top quark pair production (hbox {t}overline{hbox {t}}) events, where the lepton is an electron or muon. The products of the hadronic top quark decay are reconstructed using a single large-radius jet with transverse momentum greater than 400,text {Ge}hspace{-.08em}text {V}. The data were collected with the CMS detector at the LHC in proton-proton collisions and correspond to an integrated luminosity of 138,text {fb}^{-1}. The differential hbox {t}overline{hbox {t}} production cross section as a function of the jet mass is unfolded to the particle level and is used to extract the top quark mass. The jet mass scale is calibrated using the hadronic W boson decay within the large-radius jet. The uncertainties in the modelling of the final state radiation are reduced by studying angular correlations in the jet substructure. These developments lead to a significant increase in precision, and a top quark mass of 173.06 pm 0.84,text {Ge}hspace{-.08em}text {V} .

Clustering of red sequence galaxies in the fourth data release of the Kilo-Degree Survey

We present a sample of luminous red sequence galaxies as the basis for a study of the large-scale structure in the fourth data release of the Kilo-Degree Survey. The selected galaxies are defined by a red sequence template, in the form of a data-driven model of the colour-magnitude relation conditioned on redshift. In this work, the red sequence template was built using the broad-band optical+near infrared photometry of KiDS-VIKING and the overlapping spectroscopic data sets. The selection process involved estimating the red sequence redshifts, assessing the purity of the sample and estimating the underlying redshift distributions of redshift bins. After performing the selection, we mitigated the impact of survey properties on the observed number density of galaxies by assigning photometric weights to the galaxies. We measured the angular two-point correlation function of the red galaxies in four redshift bins and constrain the large-scale bias of our red sequence sample assuming a fixed ΛCDM cosmology. We find consistent linear biases for two luminosity-threshold samples (‘dense’ and ‘luminous’). We find that our constraints are well characterised by the passive evolution model.

Event-Shape-Dependent Analysis of Charm–Anticharm Azimuthal Correlations in Simulations

In high-energy collisions of small systems, by high-enough final-state multiplicities, a collective behaviour is present that is similar to the flow patterns observed in heavy-ion collisions. Recent studies connect this collectivity to semi-soft vacuum-QCD processes. Here we explore QCD production mechanisms using angular correlations of heavy flavour using simulated proton-proton collisions at s=13 TeV with the PYTHIA8 Monte Carlo event generator. We demonstrate that the event shape is strongly connected to the production mechanisms. Flattenicity, a novel event descriptor, can be used to separate events containing the final-state radiation from the rest of the events.

Subhalo abundance matching using progenitor mass at varying redshift: two modes of stellar mass growth imprinted into the Subaru HSC galaxy clustering

ABSTRACT We propose a novel subhalo abundance matching (SHAM) model that uses the virial mass of the main progenitor of each (sub)halo Mprog as a proxy of the galaxy stellar mass M* at the time of observation. This Mprog model predicts the two-point correlation functions depending on the choice of the epoch zprog at which Mprog is quoted. With zprog as a fitting parameter, we apply the Mprog model to the angular correlation functions measured with varying stellar mass thresholds from M*, lim/(h−2 M⊙) = 1011–108.6 using a sample of galaxies at z ≃ 0.4 from the Subaru Hyper Suprime-Cam survey. The Mprog model can reproduce the observations very well over 10 h−1kpc–10 h−1Mpc. We find that, for the samples of 109.2 ≤ M*, lim/(h−2 M⊙) ≤ 1010.2, the correlation functions predicted by the widely used Vpeak model lack amplitudes at ≲1 h−1 Mpc, suggesting that Mprog is a better proxy of the galaxy stellar mass than conventional Vpeak. The zprog parameter is highest (zprog ≃ 3) for intermediate mass galaxies at M* ≃ 109.9 h−2 M⊙, and becomes smaller down to zprog ≃ 1 for both lower and higher mass galaxies. We interpret these trends as reflecting the downsizing in the in situ star formation in lower mass galaxies and the larger contribution of the ex situ stellar mass growth in higher mass galaxies.

Measurements of the Elliptic and Triangular Azimuthal Anisotropies in Central ^{3}He+Au, d+Au and p+Au Collisions at sqrt[s_{NN}]=200 GeV.

The elliptic (v_{2}) and triangular (v_{3}) azimuthal anisotropy coefficients in central ^{3}He+Au, d+Au, and p+Au collisions at sqrt[s_{NN}]=200 GeV are measured as a function of transverse momentum (p_{T}) at midrapidity (|η|<0.9), via the azimuthal angular correlation between two particles both at |η|<0.9. While the v_{2}(p_{T}) values depend on the colliding systems, the v_{3}(p_{T}) values are system independent within the uncertainties, suggesting an influence on eccentricity from subnucleonic fluctuations in these small-sized systems. These results also provide stringent constraints for the hydrodynamic modeling of these systems.

Cross-section measurements for the production of a Z boson in association with high-transverse-momentum jets in pp collisions at sqrt{s} = 13 TeV with the ATLAS detector

Cross-section measurements for a Z boson produced in association with high-transverse-momentum jets (pT ≥ 100 GeV) and decaying into a charged-lepton pair (e+e−, μ+μ−) are presented. The measurements are performed using proton–proton collisions at sqrt{s} = 13 TeV corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 139 fb−1 collected by the ATLAS experiment at the LHC. Measurements of angular correlations between the Z boson and the closest jet are performed in events with at least one jet with pT ≥ 500 GeV. Event topologies of particular interest are the collinear emission of a Z boson in dijet events and a boosted Z boson recoiling against a jet. Fiducial cross sections are compared with state-of-the-art theoretical predictions. The data are found to agree with next-to-next-to-leading-order predictions by NNLOjet and with the next-to-leading-order multi-leg generators MadGraph5_aMC@NLO and Sherpa.