Aspects of symmetry breaking in Grand Unified Theories

Abstract

We reconsider the issue of spontaneous symmetry breaking in SO(10) grand unified theories. The emphasis is put on the quest for the minimal Higgs sector leading to a phenomenologically viable breaking to the standard model gauge group. Longstanding results claimed that nonsupersymmetric SO(10) models with just the adjoint representation triggering the first stage of the breaking cannot provide a successful gauge unification. The main result of this thesis is the observation that this no-go is an artifact of the tree level potential and that quantum corrections opens in a natural way the vacuum patterns favoured by gauge coupling unification. An analogous no-go, preventing the breaking of SO(10) at the renormalizable level with representations up to the adjoint, holds in the supersymmetric case as well. In this respect we show that a possible way-out is provided by considering the flipped SO(10) embedding of the hypercharge. Finally, the case is made for the hunting of the minimal SO(10) theory.

Ph.D. Thesis (SISSA, Trieste), 227 pages, 33 figures

References in corpus (20)

• Indication of Electron Neutrino Appearance from an Accelerator-produced Off-axis Muon Neutrino Beam
• Updated Values of Running Quark and Lepton Masses
• Left-Right Symmetry: from LHC to Neutrinoless Double Beta Decay
• General CP Violation in Minimal Left-Right Symmetric Model and Constraints on the Right-Handed Scale
• Probing seesaw at LHC
• Fermion Masses in SO(10) Models
• Fermion masses and mixings in SO(10) models and the neutrino challenge to supersymmetric grand unified theories
• Minimal SO(10) splits supersymmetry
• Proton lifetime bounds from chirally symmetric lattice QCD
• Fermion masses and mixings in a renormalizable SO(10) x Z_2 GUT
• Higgs Masses in the Minimal SUSY SO(10) GUT
• Minimal supersymmetric SU(5) theory and proton decay: where do we stand?
• Pinning down the New Minimal Supersymmetric GUT
• Minimal Supersymmetric SU(5) and Gauge Coupling Unification at Three Loops
• Quark and lepton masses and mixing in SO(10) with a GUT-scale vector matter
• Type II see-saw dominance in SO(10)
• Minimal Flipped SO(10) x U(1) Supersymmetric Higgs Model
• Three Extra Mirror or Sequential Families: a Case for Heavy Higgs and Inert Doublet
• Flavour structure of supersymmetric SO(10) GUTs with extended matter sector
• SO(10): a theory of fermion masses and mixings

Cited by in corpus (14)

• A non Supersymmetric SO(10) Grand Unified Model for All the Physics below $M_{GUT}$
• Dark Matter and Gauge Coupling Unification in Non-supersymmetric SO(10) Grand Unified Models
• Axion Predictions in $SO(10)\times U(1{)}_{\mathrm{PQ}}$ Models
• The Higgs: so simple yet so unnatural
• Surveying the SO(10) Model Landscape: The Left-Right Symmetric Case
• Spin(11,3), particles and octonions
• Weakly-Interacting Massive Particles in Non-supersymmetric SO(10) Grand Unified Models
• The ATLAS Diboson Resonance in Non-Supersymmetric SO(10)
• The Techni-Pati-Salam Composite Higgs
• Grand unification and the Planck scale: An $SO(10)$ example of radiative symmetry breaking
• Discovering and profiling Z' bosons using asymmetry observables in top quark pair production with the lepton-plus-jets final state at the LHC
• Unification of the four forces in the Spin(11,1) geometric algebra
• Inflation, Proton Decay, and Higgs-Portal Dark Matter in $SO(10)\times U(1{)}_{\psi }$
• Symmetry Breaking and Proton Decay in Spectral Pati-Salam Model