Abstracts:

Liron Barak: "B2g - Beyond the diphoton searches in the ATLAS experiment"

Abstract: Several theories beyond the Standard Model, like the 2HDM, predict the existence of high mass Higgs particles. The excellent operation of the LHC during Run-II at an unprecedented centre-of-mass energy of 13 TeV has enabled ATLAS to produce many new results in searches for such new particles. This talk will highlight chosen BSM results as well as describe the full story of the di-photon excess.

Gia Dvali: "Hierarchy problem, naturalness & physics of New Physics"

Abstract: N/A.

Franco Frasconi: "Observing the universe with interferometric detectors for gravitational waves: status and perspectives"

Abstract: The first direct observations of Gravitational Waves signals with ground based large interferometers are opening a new era in astronomy and astrophysics, a century after the development of the General Relativity theory predicting their existence. Great improvements and experience have been acquired in operating the first generation instruments fixing some important parameters for future generations of detectors aimed to a continuous observation of Gravitational Waves emitted by black holes, neutron stars and other enigmatic sources of these weak signals. The importance of a worldwide network based on second generation of laser interferometers in localizing Gravitational Waves sources in the sky is here underlined. While an overview of the technological improvements performed in the construction of these sophisticated detectors is presented with particular emphasis to the Advanced VIRGO interferometer. This European experimental apparatus together with the two similar ones, Advanced LIGO in USA, will have the opportunity to increase of a factor 1000 the observable volume of the Universe.

Lars Hofer: "The flavour anomalies: QCD or New Physics?"

Abstract: Several tensions in exclusive semileptonic B decays have been found at the LHC yielding a global significance of more than 4 sigma. I will discuss the current experimental status and contrast explanations in terms of non-perturbative hadronic effects with solutions via high-scale New Physics. I will further present a selection of New Physics models that have been proposed to solve the anomalies and discuss their phenomenological impact and the consequences for direct searches.

David Kaplan: "A lattice formulation for chiral gauge theory?"

Abstract: Combining five dimensional domain wall fermions in Euclidian space with gauge fields that undergo gradient flow in the fifth dimension can can lead to a gauge theory of interacting chiral fermions on one boundary, and "fluff" on the other: mirror fermions which do not interact with gauge fields except through their topology. I describe how this works and attempts to formulate the effective four dimensional lattice theory of the surface modes. Can this serve as a nonperturbative regulator for chiral gauge theories? Does the existence of "fluff" imply new phenomenology for these theories?

Martin Kunz: "The status of standard cosmology and the future with Euclid and SKA"

Abstract: I will briefly review the current status of the standard cosmological model, based on recent data from the CMB, galaxy surveys (BAO, redshift space distortions), supernovae, weak lensing and direct H0 measurements. I will then provide a glimpse into what we can expect for the near and mid future from the upcoming surveys Euclid and SKA.

Christine Muschik: "Real time dynamics in lattice gauge theories with a trapped ion computer"

Abstract: Gauge theories are fundamental to our understanding of interactions between the elementary constituents of matter as mediated by gauge bosons. However, computing the real-time dynamics in gauge theories is a notorious challenge for classical computational methods. In the spirit of Feynman's vision of a quantum simulator, this has recently stimulated theoretical effort to devise schemes for simulating such theories on engineered quantum-mechanical devices, with the difficulty that gauge invariance and the associated local conservation laws (Gauss laws) need to be implemented. Here we report the first experimental demonstration of a digital quantum simulation of a lattice gauge theory, by realising 1+1-dimensional quantum electrodynamics (Schwinger model) on a few-qubit trapped-ion quantum computer. We are interested in the real-time evolution of the Schwinger mechanism, describing the instability of the bare vacuum due to quantum fluctuations, which manifests itself in the spontaneous creation of electron-positron pairs. To make efficient use of our quantum resources, we map the original problem to a spin model by eliminating the gauge fields in favour of exotic long-range interactions, which have a direct and efficient implementation on an ion trap architecture. We explore the Schwinger mechanism of particle-antiparticle generation by monitoring the mass production and the vacuum persistence amplitude. Moreover, we track the real-time evolution of entanglement in the system, which illustrates how particle creation and entanglement generation are directly related. Our work represents a first step towards quantum simulating high-energy theories with atomic physics experiments, the long-term vision being the extension to real-time quantum simulations of non-Abelian lattice gauge theories.

Matthew Reece: "Exploring the Weak Gravity Conjecture"

Abstract: The Weak Gravity Conjecture (WGC), in its original form, says that given an abelian gauge theory there should be at least one charged particle whose charge is bigger than its mass in Planck units. This has surprisingly powerful implications for the possibility of large-field inflation. In this talk I will discuss some of the arguments linking the conjecture to cosmology, and present some evidence that strong versions of the conjecture are likely to be true.

Marika Taylor: "Entanglement and holography"

Abstract: Entanglement entropy is an interesting computable in both quantum information and more generally in condensed matter systems. In recent years gauge/gravity duality has been used to calculate entanglement entropy in a wide range of strongly coupled quantum field theories. This talk will review how entanglement entropy is calculated, what features of the QFT it captures, and what entanglement entropy might teach us about RG flows in quantum field theories. The talk will conclude with a discussion of how entanglement entropy is related to longstanding questions in black hole physics and quantum gravity.

Carlos Wagner: "Possible hints of New Physics in Higgs data"

Abstract: N/A.