Linda Carpenter (Ohio State U.)

Axion Quality and Large Gauge Group Hidden Sectors

While the axion remains one of the few viable solutions to the strong CP problem, it is known that extremely supressed PQ breaking operators could in principle ruin the axion solution. To preserve the axion quality without invoking an extremely large discrete symmetry, I propose models in which PQ breaking  arises in a sector with a gauge symmetry. One

expect the gauge symmetry to partially protect the PQ symmetry, as any

gauge singlets which break PQ would be composites of a high dimension.

Sept 18 at 4pm in Geo/Phys Room 407