Cosmology and particle physics in the LHC era

由于大型强子对撞机、寻找新的光矢量玻色子(重光子)、普朗克和费米卫星等世界级实验的潜在发现，以及直接探测暗物质的大量努力，未来五年我们对宇宙学/粒子物理界面的理解可能会有巨大的进步。我们的提议旨在通过解决粒子宇宙学的几个方面来利用一系列希望的可能性：在粒子物理标准模型的扩展中产生宇宙的物质-反物质不对称性，来自“隐藏部分”的暗物质模型，衰变暗能量的模型，以及作为宇宙常数问题的解决方案的自发破缺的标度不变性。具体地说，我们打算改进模型的预测，这些模型可以解释物质-反物质相对于新粒子性质的不对称性，这些新粒子可以在CERN的大型强子对撞机上发现。我们还将完善暗物质的几个组成部分的理论预测，以便在直接和间接搜索中发现。此外，我们建议继续研究粒子物理现象学的主题，研究最近关于在Tevatron对撞机上产生顶夸克的令人惊讶的实验结果的解释。我们将研究纯宇宙学的主题，特别是通过采用为天体物理环境中的强引力(黑洞和中子星的合并)开发的数值代码，以了解强重力对宇宙学中的非均匀问题的影响，例如膨胀的初始条件。我们的计划探索了一些新的物理模型，这些模型将在不久的将来通过目前的对撞机和暗物质搜索实验进行测试。如果这些模型中的任何一个通过实验得到验证，它们将让我们深入了解在当前标准模型之外对物理学知识的难以捉摸的搜索。

The next five years are likely see a dramatic advance in our understanding of the cosmology/particle physics interface, thanks to the potential discoveries anticipated from world-class experiments like the Large Hadron Collider, searches for new light vector bosons ("heavy photons"), the Planck and Fermi satellites, and numerous efforts at direct detection of dark matter. Our proposal aims to take advantage of a range of the hoped-for possibilities by addressing several aspects of particle-cosmology: the generation of the matter-antimatter asymmetry of the universe in extensions of the standard model of particle physics, models of dark matter coming from a "hidden sector," models of decaying dark energy, and spontaneously broken scale invariance as a solution to the cosmological constant problem. Specifically, we intend to improve the predictions of models that can explain the matter-antimatter asymmetry relative to the properties of new particles that can be discovered at CERN's Large Hadron Collider. We will also refine the predictions of theories with several components of dark matter for discovery in direct and indirect searches. Moreover we propose to pursue topics in particle physics phenomenology, to study explanations for recent surprising experimental results concerning the production of top quarks at the Tevatron collider. We will examine topics in pure cosmology, particularly by adapting numerical codes developed for strong gravity in astrophysical settings (mergers of black holes and neutron stars) to understand the effects of strong gravity on inhomogeneous problems in cosmology, such as initial conditions for inflation. Our program explores a number of models of new physics that will be tested in the near future by current collider and dark matter search experiments. If any of these models are validated by experiment, they will give us insight into the elusive search for knowledge of physics beyond the current standard model.