Non-relativistic Effective Field Theory Research Articles

Nonperturbative effects on electroweakly interacting massive particles at hadron collider

Electroweakly Interacting Massive Particles (EWIMPs), in other words, new massive particles that are charged under the electroweak interaction of the Standard Model (SM), are often predicted in various new physics models. EWIMPs are probed at hadron collider experiments not only by observing their direct productions but also by measuring their quantum effects on Drell-Yan processes for SM lepton pair productions. Such effects are known to be enhanced especially when the di-lepton invariant mass of the final state is close to the EWIMP threshold, namely twice the EWIMP mass. In such a mass region, however, we have to carefully take non-perturbative effects into account, because the EWIMPs become non-relativistic and the prediction may be significantly affected by e.g., bound states of the EWIMPs caused by the electroweak interaction. We study such non-perturbative effects using the non-relativistic effective field theory of the EWIMPs, and found that those indeed affect the differential cross section of the Drell-Yan processes significantly, though the effects are smeared due to the finite energy resolution of the lepton measurement at the Large Hadron Collider experiment.

Nonrelativistic effective field theory with a resonance field

We discuss shallow resonances in the nonrelativistic scattering of two particles using an effective field theory (EFT) that includes an auxiliary field with the quantum numbers of the resonance. We construct the manifestly renormalized scattering amplitude up to next-to-leading order in a systematic expansion. For a narrow resonance, the amplitude is perturbative except in the immediate vicinity of the resonance poles. It naturally has a zero in the low-energy region, analogous to the Ramsauer-Townsend effect. For a broad resonance, the leading-order amplitude is nonperturbative almost everywhere in the regime of validity of the EFT. We regain the results of an EFT without the auxiliary field, which is equivalent to the effective-range expansion with large scattering length and effective range. We also consider an additional fine tuning leading to a low-energy amplitude zero even for a broad resonance. We show that in all cases the requirement of renormalizability when the auxiliary field is not a ghost ensures the resonance poles are in the lower half of the complex momentum plane, as expected by other arguments. The systematic character of the EFT expansion is exemplified with a toy model serving as underlying theory.

First experimental constraints on WIMP couplings in the effective field theory framework from CDEX

We present weakly interacting massive particles (WIMPs) search results performed using two approaches of effective field theory from the China Dark Matter Experiment (CDEX), based on the data from both CDEX-1B and CDEX-10 stages. In the nonrelativistic effective field theory approach, both time-integrated and annual modulation analyses were used to set new limits for the coupling of WIMP-nucleon effective operators at 90% confidence level (C.L.) and improve over the current bounds in the low $m_{\chi}$ region. In the chiral effective field theory approach, data from CDEX-10 were used to set an upper limit on WIMP-pion coupling at 90% C.L. We for the first time extended the limit to the $m_{\chi}<$ 6 GeV/$c^2$ region.

Explaining the Many Threshold Structures in the Heavy-Quark Hadron Spectrum.

Tremendous progress has been made experimentally in the hadron spectrum containing heavy quarks in the last two decades. It is surprising that many resonant structures are around thresholds of a pair of heavy hadrons. There should be a threshold cusp at any S-wave threshold. By constructing a nonrelativistic effective field theory with open channels, we discuss the generalities of threshold behavior, and offer an explanation of the abundance of near-threshold peaks in the heavy quarkonium regime. We show that the threshold cusp can show up as a peak only for channels with attractive interaction, and the width of the cusp is inversely proportional to the reduced mass relevant for the threshold. We argue that there should be threshold structures at any threshold of a pair of heavy-quark and heavy-antiquark hadrons, which have attractive interaction at threshold, in the invariant mass distribution of a heavy quarkonium and light hadrons that couple to that open-flavor hadron pair. The structure becomes more pronounced if there is a near-threshold pole. Predictions of the possible pairs are also given for the ground state heavy hadrons. Precisely measuring the threshold structures will play an important role in revealing the heavy-hadron interactions, and thus understanding the puzzling hidden-charm and hidden-bottom structures.

Finite-volume energy shift of the three-pion ground state

Using the framework of nonrelativistic effective field theory, the finite-volume ground-state energy shift is calculated up to and including $O({L}^{\ensuremath{-}6})$ for the system of three pions in the channel with the total isospin $I=1$. The relativistic corrections are included perturbatively, up to the same order in the inverse of the box size $L$. The obtained explicit expression, together with the known result for the system with maximal isospin $I=3$, can be used for the extraction of two independent effective three-body couplings from the measured ground-state spectrum of three pions.

Charged multihadron systems in lattice QCD+QED

Systems with the quantum numbers of up to twelve charged and neutral pseudoscalar mesons, as well as one-, two-, and three-nucleon systems, are studied using dynamical lattice quantum chromodynamics and quantum electrodynamics (QCD+QED) calculations and effective field theory. QED effects on hadronic interactions are determined by comparing systems of charged and neutral hadrons after tuning the quark masses to remove strong isospin breaking effects. A non-relativistic effective field theory, which perturbatively includes finite-volume Coulomb effects, is analyzed for systems of multiple charged hadrons and found to accurately reproduce the lattice QCD+QED results. QED effects on charged multi-hadron systems beyond Coulomb photon exchange are determined by comparing the two- and three-body interaction parameters extracted from the lattice QCD+QED results for charged and neutral multi-hadron systems.

On the three-particle analog of the Lellouch-L\xfcscher formula

Using non-relativistic effective field theory, we derive a three-particle analog of the Lellouch-Lüscher formula at the leading order. This formula relates the three-particle decay amplitudes in a finite volume with their infinite-volume counterparts and, hence, can be used to study the three-particle decays on the lattice. The generalization of the approach to higher orders is briefly discussed.

Exceptional nonrelativistic effective field theories with enhanced symmetries

We initiate the classification of nonrelativistic effective field theories (EFTs) for Nambu-Goldstone (NG) bosons, possessing a set of redundant, coordinate-dependent symmetries. Similarly to the relativistic case, such EFTs are natural candidates for “exceptional” theories, whose scattering amplitudes feature an enhanced soft limit, that is, scale with a higher power of momentum at long wavelengths than expected based on the mere presence of Adler’s zero. The starting point of our framework is the assumption of invariance under spacetime translations and spatial rotations. The setup is nevertheless general enough to accommodate a variety of nontrivial kinematical algebras, including the Poincaré, Galilei (or Bargmann) and Carroll algebras. Our main result is an explicit construction of the nonrelativistic versions of two infinite classes of exceptional theories: the multi-Galileon and the multi-flavor Dirac-Born-Infeld (DBI) theories. In both cases, we uncover novel Wess-Zumino terms, not present in their relativistic counterparts, realizing nontrivially the shift symmetries acting on the NG fields. We demonstrate how the symmetries of the Galileon and DBI theories can be made compatible with a nonrelativistic, quadratic dispersion relation of (some of) the NG modes.

Relativistic N-particle energy shift in finite volume

We present a general method for deriving the energy shift of an interacting system of N spinless particles in a finite volume. To this end, we use the nonrelativistic effective field theory (NREFT), and match the pertinent low-energy constants to the scattering amplitudes. Relativistic corrections are explicitly included up to a given order in the 1/L expansion. We apply this method to obtain the ground state of N particles, and the first excited state of two and three particles to order L−6 in terms of the threshold parameters of the two- and three-particle relativistic scattering amplitudes. We use these expressions to analyze the N-particle ground state energy shift in the complex φ4 theory.

Gapped Goldstones at the cut-off scale: a non-relativistic EFT

At finite density, the spontaneous breakdown of an internal non-Abelian symmetry dictates, along with gapless modes, modes whose gap is fixed by the algebra and proportional to the chemical potential: the gapped Goldstones. Generically the gap of these states is comparable to that of other non-universal excitations or to the energy scale where the dynamics is strongly coupled. This makes it non-straightforward to derive a universal effective field theory (EFT) description realizing all the symmetries. Focusing on the illustrative example of a fully broken SU(2) group, we demonstrate that such an EFT can be constructed by carving out around the Goldstones, gapless and gapped, at small 3-momentum. The rules governing the EFT, where the gapless Goldstones are soft while the gapped ones are slow, are those of standard nonrelativistic EFTs, like for instance nonrelativistic QED. In particular, the EFT Lagrangian formally preserves gapped Goldstone number, and processes where such number is not conserved are described inclusively by allowing for imaginary parts in the Wilson coefficients. Thus, while the symmetry is manifestly realized in the EFT, unitarity is not. We comment on the application of our construction to the study of the large charge sector of conformal field theories with non-Abelian symmetries.

Study of sensitivity to dark matter scattering for liquid argon detectors in EFT framework

The framework of nonrelativistic effective field theory (NREFT) aims to generalize the standard analysis of direct detection experiments in terms of spin-dependent (SD) and spin-independent (SI) interactions. Here we performed EFT analysis and obtained sensitivity curves for liquid argon detectors to scattering of dark matter (DM) particles in case of different interaction models. DM velocity distribution and experimental dependencies are also described.

MS renormalization of S-wave quarkonium wavefunctions at the origin

We compute S-wave quarkonium wavefunctions at the origin in the overline{mathrm{MS}} scheme based on nonrelativistic effective field theories. We include the effects of nonperturbative long-distance behaviors of the potentials, while we determine the short-distance behaviors of the potentials in perturbative QCD. We obtain overline{mathrm{MS}} -renormalized quarkonium wavefunctions at the origin that have the correct scale dependences that are expected from perturbative QCD, so that the scale dependences cancel in physical quantities. Based on the calculation of the wavefunctions at the origin, we make model-independent predictions of decay constants and electromagnetic decay rates of S-wave charmonia and bottomonia, and compare them with measurements. We find that the poor convergence of perturbative QCD corrections are substantially improved when we include corrections to the wavefunctions at the origin in the calculation of decay constants and decay rates.

FeynOnium: using FeynCalc for automatic calculations in Nonrelativistic Effective Field Theories

We present new results on FeynOnium, an ongoing project to develop a general purpose software toolkit for semi-automatic symbolic calculations in nonrelativistic Effective Field Theories (EFTs). Building upon FeynCalc, an existing Mathematica package for symbolic evaluation of Feynman diagrams, we have created a powerful framework for automatizing calculations in nonrelativistic EFTs (NREFTs) at tree- and 1-loop level. This is achieved by exploiting the novel features of FeynCalc that support manipulations of Cartesian tensors, Pauli matrices and nonstandard loop integrals. Additional operations that are common in nonrelativistic EFT calculations are implemented in a dedicated add-on called FeynOnium. While our current focus is on EFTs for strong interactions of heavy quarks, extensions to other systems that admit a nonrelativistic EFT description are planned for the future. All our codes are open-source and publicly available. Furthermore, we provide several example calculations that demonstrate how FeynOnium can be employed to reproduce known results from the literature.

Constraints on dark matter-nucleon effective couplings in the presence of kinematically distinct halo substructures using the DEAP-3600 detector

DEAP-3600 is a single-phase liquid argon detector aiming to directly detect Weakly Interacting Massive Particles (WIMPs), located at SNOLAB (Sudbury, Canada). After analyzing data taken during the first year of operation, a null result was used to place an upper bound on the WIMP-nucleon spin-independent, isoscalar cross section. This study reinterprets this result within a Non-Relativistic Effective Field Theory framework, and further examines how various possible substructures in the local dark matter halo may affect these constraints. Such substructures are hinted at by kinematic structures in the local stellar distribution observed by the Gaia satellite and other recent astronomical surveys. These include the Gaia Sausage (or Enceladus), as well as a number of distinct streams identified in recent studies. Limits are presented for the coupling strength of the effective contact interaction operators $\mathcal{O}_1$, $\mathcal{O}_3$, $\mathcal{O}_5$, $\mathcal{O}_8$, and $\mathcal{O}_{11}$, considering isoscalar, isovector, and xenonphobic scenarios, as well as the specific operators corresponding to millicharge, magnetic dipole, electric dipole, and anapole interactions. The effects of halo substructures on each of these operators are explored as well, showing that the $\mathcal{O}_5$ and $\mathcal{O}_8$ operators are particularly sensitive to the velocity distribution, even at dark matter masses above 100 GeV/$c^2$.

Hadronic transitions in quarkonium

We report on a new approach to compute quarkonium hadronic transitions which does not rely on the standard twist expansion of the intermediate octet propagator. The latter cannot be justified for the energy release of hadronic transitions between heavy quarkonium states with different principal quantum numbers. Instead, we use that the octet state spectrum corresponds to the hybrid quarkonium one which can be obtained from nonrelativistic effective field theories (EFT) of QCD and lattice computations of the heavy-quark-antiquark static energies.

Extraction of ND scattering lengths from the Λb → π−pD0 decay and properties of the Σc(2800)+

The isovector and isoscalar ND s-wave scattering lengths are extracted by fitting to the LHCb data of the pD0 invariant-mass distribution in the decay Λb→π−pD0, making use of the cusp effect at the nD+ threshold. The analysis is based on a coupled-channel nonrelativistic effective field theory. We find that the real part of the isovector ND scattering length is unnaturally large due to the existence of a near-threshold state with a mass around 2.8 GeV. The state is consistent with the Σc(2800)+ resonance observed at Belle. Our results suggest that it couples strongly to the ND channel in an s-wave, and that its quantum numbers are JP=1/2−. The strong cusp behavior at the nD+ threshold can be verified using updated LHCb data.

Nonrelativistic effective field theory for heavy exotic hadrons

We propose an effective field theory to describe hadrons with two heavy quarks without any assumption on the typical distance between the heavy quarks with respect to the typical hadronic scale. The construction is based on Non-Relativistic QCD and inspired in the strong coupling regime of Potential Non-Relativistic QCD. We construct the effective theory at leading and next-to-leading order in the inverse heavy-quark mass expansion for arbitrary quantum numbers of the light degrees of freedom. Hence our results hold for hybrids, tetraquarks, double heavy baryons and pentaquarks, for which we also present the corresponding operators at Non-Relativistic level. At leading order, the effective theory enjoys heavy quark spin symmetry and corresponds to the Born-Oppenheimer approximation. At next-to-leading order, spin and velocity dependent terms arise, which produce splittings in the heavy-quark spin symmetry multiplets. A concrete application to double heavy baryons is presented in an accompanying paper.

Effective theories for a nonrelativistic field in an expanding universe: Induced self-interaction, pressure, sound speed, and viscosity

A massive, nonrelativistic scalar field in an expanding spacetime is usually approximated by a pressureless perfect fluid, which leads to the standard conclusion that such a field can play the role of cold dark matter. In this paper, we systematically study these approximations, incorporating subleading corrections. We provide two equivalent effective descriptions of the system, each of which offers its own advantages and insights: (i) A nonrelativistic effective field theory (EFT) with which we show that the relativistic corrections induce an effective self-interaction for the nonrelativistic field. As a byproduct, our EFT also allows one to construct the exact solution, including oscillatory behavior, which is often difficult to achieve from the exact equations. (ii) An effective (imperfect) fluid description, with which we demonstrate that, for a perturbed Friedmann-Lemaître- Robertson-Walker (FLRW) universe: (a) The pressure is small but nonzero (and positive), even for a free theory with no tree-level self-interactions. (b) The sound speed of small fluctuations is also nonzero (and positive), reproducing already known leading-order results, correcting a subdominant term, and identifying a new contribution that had been omitted in previous analyses. (c) The fluctuations experience a negative effective bulk viscosity. The positive sound speed and the negative bulk viscosity act in favor of and against the growth of overdensities, respectively. The net effect may be considered a smoking gun for ultra-light dark matter.

QCD spin effects in the heavy hybrid potentials and spectra

The spin-dependent operators for heavy quarkonium hybrids have been recently obtained in a nonrelativistic effective field theory approach up to next-to-leading order in the heavy-quark mass expansion. In the effective field theory for hybrids several operators not found in standard quarkonia appear, including an operator suppressed by only one power of the heavy-quark mass. We compute the matching coefficients for these operators in the short heavy-quark-antiquark distance regime, $r\ll 1/\Lambda_{\rm QCD}$, by matching weakly-coupled potential NRQCD to the effective field theory for hybrids. In this regime the perturbative and nonperturbative contributions to the matching coefficients factorize, and the latter can be expressed in terms of purely gluonic correlators whose form we explicitly calculate with the aid of the transformation properties of the gluon fields under discrete symmetries. We detail our previous comparison with direct lattice computations of the charmonium hybrid spectrum, from which the unknown nonperturbative contributions can be obtained, and extend it to data sets with different light-quark masses.

Implications of the Gaia sausage for dark matter nuclear interactions

The advent of the Gaia era has led to potentially revolutionary understanding of dark matter (DM) dynamics in our galaxy, which has important consequences for direct detection (DD) experiments. In this paper, we study how the empirical DM velocity distribution inferred from Gaia-Sausage, a dominant substructure in the solar neighborhood, affects the interpretation of DD data. We survey different classes of operators in the non-relativistic effective field theory that could arise from several relativistic benchmark models and emphasize that the Gaia velocity distribution could modify both the total number of events as well as the shape of the differential recoil spectra, the two primary observables in DD experiments. Employing the euclideanized signal method, we investigate the effects of the Gaia distribution on reconstructing DM model parameters and identifying the correct DM model given a positive signal at future DD experiments. We find that for light DM with mass ~10 GeV, the Gaia distribution poses an additional challenge for characterizing DM interactions with ordinary matter, which may be addressed by combining complementary DD experiments with different targets and lowering the detection threshold. Meanwhile, for heavy DM with mass above ~30 GeV, depending on the type of DM model, there could be a (moderate) improvement in the sensitivity at future DD experiments.