Pith. sign in

REVIEW 4 cited by

Ruling out light axions: the writing is on the wall

Not yet reviewed by Pith; the record is open.

Re-run · record.json Download PDF Read on arXiv ↗

This paper has not been read by Pith yet. Machine review is queued; the pith claim, tier, and objections will appear here once it completes.

SPECIMEN: schema-true, not a live event

T0 review · schema-true

One-sentence machine reading of the paper's core claim.

pith:XXXXXXXX · record.json · timestamp

arxiv 2211.14635 v5 pith:3JZ3MN4G submitted 2022-11-26 hep-ph astro-ph.CO

Konstantin A. Beyer , Subir Sarkar This is my paper · ORCID
classification hep-phastro-ph.CO
keywords axionwallnetworkdomainduringinflationpeccei-quinnruling
verification ladder T0 review T1 audit T2 compute T3 formal
0 comments
read the original abstract

We revisit the domain wall problem for QCD axion models with more than one quark charged under the Peccei-Quinn symmetry. Symmetry breaking during or after inflation results in the formation of a domain wall network which would cause cosmic catastrophe if it comes to dominate the Universe. The network may be made unstable by invoking a `tilt' in the axion potential due to Planck scale suppressed non-renormalisable operators. Alternatively the random walk of the axion field during inflation can generate a `bias' favouring one of the degenerate vacua, but we find that this mechanism is in practice irrelevant. Consideration of the axion abundance generated by the decay of the wall network then requires the Peccei-Quinn scale to be rather low -- thus ruling out e.g. the DFSZ axion with mass below 11 meV, where most experimental searches are in fact focussed.

Discussion (0). Continue with ORCID to comment.

Forward citations

Cited by 4 Pith papers

Reviewed papers in the Pith corpus that reference this work. Sorted by Pith novelty score. Full citation record

  1. Accidental Peccei-Quinn Symmetry From Gauged U(1) and a High Quality Axion

    hep-ph 2024-12 conditional novelty 6.0 of 10

    Three explicit axion models are built where a gauged axial U(1) makes the Peccei-Quinn symmetry accidental, preserving axion quality against quantum gravity and giving domain wall number one.

  2. Monodromic transparency of axion domain walls

    hep-ph 2024-12 accept novelty 6.0 of 10

    Axion domain walls become transparent to low-energy photons at E/N=8/3 because of axion-pion cancellation, making thermal friction scale as T^8 rather than e^{-ma/T}.

  3. A Non-Inflationary Axion and ALP Misalignment Mechanism

    hep-ph 2025-07 conditional novelty 5.0 of 10

    A thermally mediated, Planck-suppressed symmetry breaking potential can supply the initial axion misalignment that inflationary cosmology normally provides, allowing late-time coherent oscillations without inflation.

  4. About electroweak domain walls in Majoron models

    hep-ph 2025-06 conditional novelty 5.0 of 10

    Electroweak instantons alone do not produce Majoron domain walls; a tiny instanton mass from B+L breaking is cosmologically negligible and can act as a bias or dark energy.

Pith tools