Work

Hiding new physics at the end of field space

Year: 2025

Type: article

Abstract: Is field space infinite? If not, it either loops back on itself or ends altogether. Periodic boundary conditions are of course familiar, but field space endpoints—which appear in real-world systems—are far less explored. In this paper we argue that boundaries in field space are generic, radiatively stable structures that allow for new physics at very low scales not ruled out by experiment. Such boundaries are delocalized in field space from the vacuum, so they can only be accessed by coherent fields or high multiplicity processes, both of which are weakly constrained observationally. Low multiplicity interactions do not detect the boundary and instead perceive a “mirage cutoff” that is parametrically higher than the true cutoff of the theory. Hence, field space boundaries are deformations of the standard model that are Lorentz invariant, local, unitary at low energies, and experimentally unconstrained. We comment on the possibility of field space boundaries on the long-range force carriers and the Higgs, as well as possible implications for the hierarchy problem.

Source: Physical review. D/Physical review. D.

DOI: 10.1103/ycb8-sj4l

Authors: Clifford Cheung, Ira Z. Rothstein

Institutions: California Institute of Technology, Carnegie Mellon University

Language: English

Topic: Particle physics theoretical and experimental studies

Subfield: Nuclear and High Energy Physics

Field: Physics and Astronomy

Domain: Physical Sciences

Open Access status: hybrid

Funders: U.S. Department of Energy, Walter Burke Institute for Theoretical Physics