Moduli stabilization in type II Calabi-Yau compactifications at finite temperature
A bstractWe consider the type II superstring compactified on Calabi-Yau threefolds, at finite temperature. The latter is implemented at the string level by a free action on the Euclidean time circle. We show that all Kähler and complex structure moduli involved in the gauge theories geometrically engineered in the vicinity of singular loci are lifted by the stringy thermal effective potential. The analysis is based on the effective gauged super-gravity at low energy, without integrating out the non-perturbative BPS states becoming massless at the singular loci. The universal form of the action in the weak coupling regime and at low enough temperature is determined in two cases. Namely, the conifold locus, as well as a locus where the internal space develops a genus-g curve of AN −1 singularities, thus realizing an SU(N ) gauge theory coupled to g hypermultiplets in the adjoint. In general, we argue that the favored points of stabilization sit at the intersection of several such loci. As a result, the entire vector multiplet moduli space is expected to be lifted, together with hypermultiplet moduli. The scalars are dynamically stabilized during the cosmological evolution induced by the back-reaction of the thermal effective potential on the originally static background. When the universe expands and the temperature T drops, the scalars converge to minima, with damped oscillations. Moreover, they store an energy density that scales as T4, which never dominates over radiation. The reason for this is that the mass they acquire at one-loop is of order the temperature scale, which is time-dependent rather than constant. As an example, we analyze the type IIA compactification on a hy-persurface $$ \mathbb{P}_{{\left(  \right)}}^4 $$ [12], with Hodge numbers h11 = 2 and h12 = 128. In this case, both Kähler moduli are stabilized at a point, where the internal space develops a node and an enhanced SU(2) gauge theory coupled to 2 adjoint hypermultiplets. This shows that in the dual thermal heterotic picture on K3 × T2, the torus modulus and the axio-dilaton are stabilized, though in a strong coupling heterotic regime.

title: Moduli stabilisation in early superstring cosmology
abstract: We study the cosmological evolution induced by the free energy of a string gas at finite temperature. We first consider the maximally supersymmetric heterotic string in the weak coupling regime in dimension D ≥ 4. The free energy develops local minima associated to some gauge symmetry enhancement induced by perturbative states. This can stabilize all heterotic moduli except the dilaton. By string-string S-dualities, it follows that the dual type I moduli can be stabilized by either non perturbative D-string states or perturbative open string states. We next consider the type II string compactified on Calabi-Yau three-folds, which has = 2 supersymmetry in D = 4. The moduli space has singular loci where the Calabi-Yau space undergoes extremal transitions, accompanied with either conifold transitions or certain gauge symmetry enhancement. Also the free energy reaches local minima due to the emergence of extra non perturbative massless modes. Consequently, the type II moduli are attracted to these singular loci. Using the type II/heterotic string duality, we can stabilize the dual heterotic moduli, and in particular it is possible to stabilize the heterotic dilaton.

title: Rephasing Invariance and Hierarchy of the CKM Matrix
abstract: We identified a set of four rephasing invariant parameters of the CKM matrix. They are found to exhibit hierarchies in powers of λ 2 , from λ 2 to λ 8 . It is shown that, at the present level of accuracy, only the first three parameters are needed to fit all available data on flavor physics.

title: String dynamics, spontaneous breaking of supersymmetry, and dual scalar field theory
abstract: The dynamics of a vortex string, which describes the Nambu-Goldstone modes of the spontaneous breakdown of the target space $D=4$, $N=1$ supersymmetry and internal $U(1{)}_{R}$ symmetry to the world sheet $\mathrm{ISO}(1,1)$ symmetry, is constructed by using the approach of nonlinear realization. The resulting action describing the low energy oscillations of the string into the covolume (super)space is found to have an invariant synthesis form of the Akulov-Volkov and Nambu-Goto actions. Its dual scalar field action is obtained by means of introducing two vectorial Lagrangian multipliers into the action of the string.

title: Readout electronics of the ALICE photon spectrometer
abstract: The photon spectrometer (PHOS) in the ALICE experiment at LHC is a PbWO4 crystal based electromagnetic calorimeter, dedicated to measuring photons, π°'s and η's over a broad pT range from about 100 MeV/c to 100 GeV/c with the best possible energy and position resolution. The front-end electronics of the PHOS is thus required to cover a large dynamic range, to achieve a timing resolution better than ~ 2 ns in order to discriminate against 1-2 GeV/c (anti-)neutrons, and to provide high pT trigger to select rare high pT events. In this paper, we present the full PHOS readout system, including the avalanche photo-diode, the low noise charge sensitive preamplifier, the 32 channel front-end electronics card, the trigger region unit and the trigger OR module. Results from PHOS commissioning with beam particles and cosmic rays will also be presented to address the performance of the PHOS readout electronics.

title: NON-ABELIAN VORTEX-STRING DYNAMICS FROM NONLINEAR REALIZATION
abstract: The dynamics of the non-Abelian vortex-string, which describes its low energy oscillations into the target D = 3+1 space–time as well as its orientations in the internal space, is derived by the approach of nonlinear realization. The resulting action correlating these two sectors is found to have an invariant synthesis form of the Nambu–Goto-CPN-1 model actions. Higher order corrections to the vortex actions are presented up to the order of quartic derivatives. General p-brane dynamics in terms of the internal symmetry breaking is also discussed.

title: Centrality Dependence of Charged Particle Production at Large Transverse Momentum in Pb--Pb Collisions at $\sqrt{s_{\rm{NN}}} = 2.76$ TeV
abstract: The inclusive transverse momentum ($p_{\rm T}$) distributions of primary charged particles are measured in the pseudo-rapidity range $|\eta|<0.8$ as a function of event centrality in Pb--Pb collisions at $\sqrt{s_{\rm{NN}}}=2.76$ TeV with ALICE at the LHC. The data are presented in the $p_{\rm T}$ range $0.1530$ GeV/$c$. In peripheral collisions (70--80%), the suppression is weaker with $R_{\rm{AA}} \approx 0.7$ almost independently of $p_{\rm T}$. The measured nuclear modification factors are compared to other measurements and model calculations.