General Physics Colloquium and Cooper Lecture, Professor Masha Baryakhtar, University of Washington

Title:  Ultralight Particles Across the Spectra

Host:  Maxim Perelstein

Abstract:  Theories that seek to explain the outstanding puzzles of the Standard Model of particle physics often predict ultralight, feebly-interacting particles. In this talk, I will outline a range of novel search strategies that are required for their discovery, from the laboratory to the sky. I will first focus on the early universe, where even a small trace of ultralight scalar fields can be observed through the power of the cosmic microwave background. Second, I will discuss how rotating black holes source exponentially large numbers of gravitationally-bound bosons, creating nature's laboratories for ultralight particles. These systems emit gravitational waves, allowing observatories such as LIGO to search for new particles. In the case of particles known as dark photons, the resulting system appears as a novel multimessenger source in the sky.