LEAPS-MPS: Searching for the Dark Side of the Universe with Gravitational Waves

LEAPS-MPS：用引力波寻找宇宙的黑暗面

• 批准号: 2213144
• 负责人: Bartosz Fornal
• 金额: $ 17.31万
• 依托单位: Barry University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2022
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2022-07-01 至 2024-06-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2213144&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: LEAPS; MPS; Searching; Dark; Side

This award is funded in whole or in part under the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (Public Law 117-2). The Standard Model of elementary particles and cosmology describes remarkably well the evolution of the Universe starting from one-trillionth of a second after the Big Bang up to the present day. Despite this huge success, several fundamental questions remain unanswered: What is dark matter? Why is there more matter than antimatter in the Universe? Why are neutrinos massive? Solving these mysteries requires an understanding of what happened before one-trillionth of a second after the Big Bang. The tool enabling us to dive this far back into the Universe's history has only recently been provided by the first successful detection of gravitational waves. A primordial stochastic gravitational wave background, although not yet discovered, is expected to carry information precisely about the very early period of the Universe and is the subject of this proposal. This award supports Dr. Fornal at Barry University to construct and investigate well-motivated extensions of the Standard Model which solve the outstanding problems in particle physics (Dark matter, Matter-antimatter asymmetry, and Neutrino masses) which can be tested in present and future gravitational wave experiments. The project will provide substantial contributions to advancing knowledge, training future generations of scientists and highly specialized professionals acquainted with sophisticated mathematical methods and conveying physics ideas to nonscientists through the planned outreach activities. Given the gender and demographic diversity of Barry University, the project will significantly affect women and other groups underrepresented in the scientific community, who will receive training and acquire skills preparing them for advanced-degree programs in science, increasing their competitiveness on the academic and industrial job market, and improving their admission rate into doctoral programs.The goal of the project is to produce a mapping between the parameter space of the most attractive models of elementary particles accessible in gravitational wave detectors, and the parameter space which can be probed in other experiments. The new particle physics models considered are hypothetical, but their predictions will be verifiable in current and upcoming gravitational wave experiments. Combined with a positive signal from gravitational wave detectors, the results of this project would provide a breakthrough in understanding the structure of the Universe. The educational goal is to establish an energetic and creative group of young physics researchers among Barry University undergraduates. In addition, through presenting the results at international conferences and meetings of the American Physical Society, those students will be exposed to world-class scientists working in STEM fields, which will offer them various career networking opportunities.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

该奖项全部或部分根据2021年美国救援计划法案（公法117-2）资助。 基本粒子和宇宙学的标准模型非常好地描述了宇宙从大爆炸后万亿分之一秒开始到今天的演化。尽管取得了巨大的成功，但仍有几个基本问题没有得到解答：什么是暗物质？为什么宇宙中物质比反物质多？为什么中微子质量很大？解决这些谜团需要了解大爆炸后万亿分之一秒之前发生了什么。直到最近，第一次成功探测到引力波才为我们提供了一个工具，使我们能够深入到宇宙的历史。一个原始的随机引力波背景，虽然还没有发现，预计携带的信息，精确的宇宙非常早期的时期，是这个建议的主题。 该奖项支持巴里大学的Fornal博士构建和研究标准模型的动机良好的扩展，这些扩展解决了粒子物理学中的突出问题（暗物质，物质-反物质不对称性和中微子质量），这些问题可以在现在和未来的引力波实验中进行测试。 该项目将为增进知识、培训未来几代科学家和熟悉复杂数学方法的高度专业化的专业人员以及通过计划中的外联活动向非科学家传播物理学思想作出重大贡献。鉴于巴里大学的性别和人口多样性，该项目将显著影响妇女和其他在科学界代表性不足的群体，他们将接受培训并获得技能，为他们的高级科学学位课程做准备，提高他们在学术和工业就业市场上的竞争力，该项目的目标是在引力波中最有吸引力的基本粒子模型的参数空间之间产生映射，探测器，以及可以在其他实验中探测的参数空间。所考虑的新粒子物理模型是假设的，但它们的预测将在当前和即将到来的引力波实验中得到验证。结合引力波探测器的积极信号，该项目的结果将为理解宇宙结构提供突破。教育目标是在巴里大学本科生中建立一个充满活力和创造力的年轻物理研究人员群体。此外，通过在国际会议和美国物理学会的会议上展示成果，这些学生将接触到在STEM领域工作的世界级科学家，这将为他们提供各种职业网络机会。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

项目成果

Probing early Universe supercooled phase transitions with gravitational wave data

• DOI: 10.1103/physrevd.107.023511
• 发表时间: 2022-09
• 期刊: Physical Review D
• 影响因子: 5
• 作者: C. Badger;B. Fornal;K. Martinovic;A. Romero;K. Turbang;Huai-Ke Guo;Alberto Mariotti;M. Sakellariadou;A. Sevrin;Fengwei Yang;Yue Zhao

Asymmetric dark matter from gravitational waves

• DOI: 10.1103/physrevd.106.115040
• 发表时间: 2022-09
• 期刊: Physical Review D
• 影响因子: 5
• 作者: B. Fornal;Erika Pierre