Electroweak Symmetric Balls, Theory Seminar (High Energy/Cosmology), Mrunal Prashant Korwar, UW Madison
2022-12-06 22:00 - 23:00 UTC | Chamberlin 5280
Electroweak symmetric balls are macroscopic objects with electroweak symmetry restored inside. Such an object can arise in models where dark sectors contain monopole or non-topological soliton with a Higgs portal interaction to the Standard Model. It could be produced in the early universe via phase transition or preheating mechanism, accounting for all dark matter. In a scenario where the balls are allowed to evaporate, the observed baryon asymmetry in our universe could be explained by a mechanism of “catalyzed baryogenesis.” In this mechanism, the motion of a ball-like catalyst provides the necessary out-of-equilibrium condition, its outer wall has CP-violating interactions with the Standard Model particles, and its interior has baryon number violating interactions via electroweak Sphaleron. Because of electroweak symmetric cores, such objects have a large geometric cross-section off a nucleus, generating a multi-hit signature in large-volume detectors. These objects could radiatively capture a nucleus and release GeV-scale energy for each interaction. The IceCube detector can probe dark matter balls with masses up to a gram.
