Abstract
The clockwork axion refers to a family of aligned multi-axion models that lead to an exponential hierarchy between the scale of Peccei-Quinn symmetry breaking and the scale of the axion decay constant. The clockworking can bring the Peccei-Quinn-scale particles to within reach of collider experiments. In this work we are interested in whether cosmological observations impose any new constraints on the clockwork axion. If the universe reheats above the scale of Peccei-Quinn breaking, then the ensuing cosmological phase transition produces a network of topological defects, which have a qualitatively different behavior from the string-wall network in the usual axion models. We estimate the relic abundances of axion dark matter and dark radiation that arise from the emission of axions by the defect network, and we infer a constraint on the scale of Peccei-Quinn breaking and the mass spectrum. We find that the defect contribution to the axion dark matter relic abundance is generally negligible. However, the defect production of relativistic axion dark radiation becomes significant if the scale of Peccei-Quinn symmetry breaking is larger than 100 TeV, and measurements of ΔNeff provide a new probe of this class of models.
Article PDF
Similar content being viewed by others
Avoid common mistakes on your manuscript.
References
R.D. Peccei and H.R. Quinn, CP Conservation in the Presence of Instantons, Phys. Rev. Lett. 38 (1977) 1440 [INSPIRE].
R.D. Peccei and H.R. Quinn, Constraints Imposed by CP Conservation in the Presence of Instantons, Phys. Rev. D 16 (1977) 1791 [INSPIRE].
S. Weinberg, A New Light Boson?, Phys. Rev. Lett. 40 (1978) 223 [INSPIRE].
F. Wilczek, Problem of Strong p and t Invariance in the Presence of Instantons, Phys. Rev. Lett. 40 (1978) 279 [INSPIRE].
J.E. Kim, Weak Interaction Singlet and Strong CP Invariance, Phys. Rev. Lett. 43 (1979) 103 [INSPIRE].
M.A. Shifman, A.I. Vainshtein and V.I. Zakharov, Can Confinement Ensure Natural CP Invariance of Strong Interactions?, Nucl. Phys. B 166 (1980) 493 [INSPIRE].
M. Dine, W. Fischler and M. Srednicki, A Simple Solution to the Strong CP Problem with a Harmless Axion, Phys. Lett. B 104 (1981) 199 [INSPIRE].
A.R. Zhitnitsky, On Possible Suppression of the Axion Hadron Interactions (in Russian), Sov. J. Nucl. Phys. 31 (1980) 260 [INSPIRE].
M. Kuster, G. Raffelt and B. Beltran, Axions: theory, cosmology, and experimental searches. Proceedings, 1st Joint ILIAS-CERN-CAST axion training, Geneva, Switzerland, November 30 - December 2, 2005, Lect. Notes Phys. 741 (2008) 1.
P. Di Vecchia and G. Veneziano, Chiral Dynamics in the Large N Limit, Nucl. Phys. B 171 (1980) 253 [INSPIRE].
G. Grilli di Cortona, E. Hardy, J. Pardo Vega and G. Villadoro, The QCD axion, precisely, JHEP 01 (2016) 034 [arXiv:1511.02867] [INSPIRE].
J.E. Kim, H.P. Nilles and M. Peloso, Completing natural inflation, JCAP 01 (2005) 005 [hep-ph/0409138] [INSPIRE].
K. Choi, H. Kim and S. Yun, Natural inflation with multiple sub-Planckian axions, Phys. Rev. D 90 (2014) 023545 [arXiv:1404.6209] [INSPIRE].
T. Higaki, K.S. Jeong, N. Kitajima and F. Takahashi, The QCD Axion from Aligned Axions and Diphoton Excess, Phys. Lett. B 755 (2016) 13 [arXiv:1512.05295] [INSPIRE].
K. Choi and S.H. Im, Realizing the relaxion from multiple axions and its UV completion with high scale supersymmetry, JHEP 01 (2016) 149 [arXiv:1511.00132] [INSPIRE].
D.E. Kaplan and R. Rattazzi, Large field excursions and approximate discrete symmetries from a clockwork axion, Phys. Rev. D 93 (2016) 085007 [arXiv:1511.01827] [INSPIRE].
D.J.E. Marsh, Axion Cosmology, Phys. Rept. 643 (2016) 1 [arXiv:1510.07633] [INSPIRE].
M. Farina, D. Pappadopulo, F. Rompineve and A. Tesi, The photo-philic QCD axion, JHEP 01 (2017) 095 [arXiv:1611.09855] [INSPIRE].
A. Kehagias and A. Riotto, Clockwork Inflation, Phys. Lett. B 767 (2017) 73 [arXiv:1611.03316] [INSPIRE].
T. Higaki, K.S. Jeong, N. Kitajima, T. Sekiguchi and F. Takahashi, Topological Defects and nano-Hz Gravitational Waves in Aligned Axion Models, JHEP 08 (2016) 044 [arXiv:1606.05552] [INSPIRE].
T. Higaki, K.S. Jeong, N. Kitajima and F. Takahashi, Quality of the Peccei-Quinn symmetry in the Aligned QCD Axion and Cosmological Implications, JHEP 06 (2016) 150 [arXiv:1603.02090] [INSPIRE].
Vilenkin, Alex and Shellard, Cosmic Strings and Other Topological Defects, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, U.K., (1994).
A. Vilenkin and A.E. Everett, Cosmic Strings and Domain Walls in Models with Goldstone and PseudoGoldstone Bosons, Phys. Rev. Lett. 48 (1982) 1867 [INSPIRE].
T. Vachaspati, A.E. Everett and A. Vilenkin, Radiation From Vacuum Strings and Domain Walls, Phys. Rev. D 30 (1984) 2046 [INSPIRE].
R.L. Davis, Cosmic Axions from Cosmic Strings, Phys. Lett. B 180 (1986) 225 [INSPIRE].
A. Vilenkin and T. Vachaspati, Radiation of Goldstone Bosons From Cosmic Strings, Phys. Rev. D 35 (1987) 1138 [INSPIRE].
D. Harari and P. Sikivie, On the Evolution of Global Strings in the Early Universe, Phys. Lett. B 195 (1987) 361 [INSPIRE].
A. Ahmed and B.M. Dillon, Clockwork Goldstone Bosons, Phys. Rev. D 96 (2017) 115031 [arXiv:1612.04011] [INSPIRE].
G.F. Giudice and M. McCullough, A Clockwork Theory, JHEP 02 (2017) 036 [arXiv:1610.07962] [INSPIRE].
A. Kehagias and A. Riotto, The Clockwork Supergravity, JHEP 02 (2018) 160 [arXiv:1710.04175] [INSPIRE].
G.F. Giudice, Y. Kats, M. McCullough, R. Torre and A. Urbano, Clockwork/linear dilaton: structure and phenomenology, JHEP 06 (2018) 009 [arXiv:1711.08437] [INSPIRE].
G.F. Giudice and M. McCullough, Comment on “Disassembling the Clockwork Mechanism”, arXiv:1705.10162 [INSPIRE].
N. Craig, I. Garcia Garcia and D. Sutherland, Disassembling the Clockwork Mechanism, JHEP 10 (2017) 018 [arXiv:1704.07831] [INSPIRE].
N. Craig and D. Sutherland, Exponential Hierarchies from Anderson Localization in Theory Space, Phys. Rev. Lett. 120 (2018) 221802 [arXiv:1710.01354] [INSPIRE].
D. Teresi, Clockwork without supersymmetry, Phys. Lett. B 783 (2018) 1 [arXiv:1802.01591] [INSPIRE].
P. Agrawal, J. Fan, M. Reece and L.-T. Wang, Experimental Targets for Photon Couplings of the QCD Axion, JHEP 02 (2018) 006 [arXiv:1709.06085] [INSPIRE].
T.W.B. Kibble, Topology of Cosmic Domains and Strings, J. Phys. A 9 (1976) 1387 [INSPIRE].
C. Hagmann, S. Chang and P. Sikivie, Axions from string decay, Nucl. Phys. Proc. Suppl. 72 (1999) 81 [hep-ph/9807428] [INSPIRE].
T. Hiramatsu, M. Kawasaki, T. Sekiguchi, M. Yamaguchi and J. Yokoyama, Improved estimation of radiated axions from cosmological axionic strings, Phys. Rev. D 83 (2011) 123531 [arXiv:1012.5502] [INSPIRE].
T. Hiramatsu, M. Kawasaki, K. Saikawa and T. Sekiguchi, Axion cosmology with long-lived domain walls, JCAP 01 (2013) 001 [arXiv:1207.3166] [INSPIRE].
C. Hagmann and P. Sikivie, Computer simulations of the motion and decay of global strings, Nucl. Phys. B 363 (1991) 247 [INSPIRE].
M. Nagasawa and M. Kawasaki, Collapse of axionic domain wall and axion emission, Phys. Rev. D 50 (1994) 4821 [astro-ph/9402066] [INSPIRE].
S. Chang, C. Hagmann and P. Sikivie, Studies of the motion and decay of axion walls bounded by strings, Phys. Rev. D 59 (1999) 023505 [hep-ph/9807374] [INSPIRE].
C. Hagmann, S. Chang and P. Sikivie, Axion radiation from strings, Phys. Rev. D 63 (2001) 125018 [hep-ph/0012361] [INSPIRE].
A.J. Long, J.M. Hyde and T. Vachaspati, Cosmic Strings in Hidden Sectors: 1. Radiation of Standard Model Particles, JCAP 09 (2014) 030 [arXiv:1405.7679] [INSPIRE].
T. Hiramatsu, M. Kawasaki, K. Saikawa and T. Sekiguchi, Production of dark matter axions from collapse of string-wall systems, Phys. Rev. D 85 (2012) 105020 [Erratum ibid. D 86 (2012)089902] [arXiv:1202.5851] [INSPIRE].
Planck collaboration, P.A.R. Ade et al., Planck 2015 results. XIII. Cosmological parameters, Astron. Astrophys. 594 (2016) A13 [arXiv:1502.01589] [INSPIRE].
J. Preskill, M.B. Wise and F. Wilczek, Cosmology of the Invisible Axion, Phys. Lett. B 120 (1983) 127 [INSPIRE].
L.F. Abbott and P. Sikivie, A Cosmological Bound on the Invisible Axion, Phys. Lett. B 120 (1983) 133 [INSPIRE].
M. Dine and W. Fischler, The Not So Harmless Axion, Phys. Lett. B 120 (1983) 137 [INSPIRE].
P. Fox, A. Pierce and S.D. Thomas, Probing a QCD string axion with precision cosmological measurements, hep-th/0409059 [INSPIRE].
D. Baumann, D. Green and B. Wallisch, New Target for Cosmic Axion Searches, Phys. Rev. Lett. 117 (2016) 171301 [arXiv:1604.08614] [INSPIRE].
CMB-S4 collaboration, K.N. Abazajian et al., CMB-S4 Science Book, First Edition, arXiv:1610.02743 [INSPIRE].
Open Access
This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC-BY 4.0), which permits any use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author(s) and source are credited.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Additional information
ArXiv ePrint: 1803.07086
Rights and permissions
Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made.
The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder.
To view a copy of this licence, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
About this article
Cite this article
Long, A.J. Cosmological aspects of the clockwork axion. J. High Energ. Phys. 2018, 66 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/JHEP07(2018)066
Received:
Revised:
Accepted:
Published:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/JHEP07(2018)066