On the oscillating electric dipole moment induced by axion-fermion couplings

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Main Authors: Di Luzio, Luca, Gisbert, Hector, Sørensen, Philip
Format: Preprint
Published: 2023
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author Di Luzio, Luca
Gisbert, Hector
Sørensen, Philip
author_facet Di Luzio, Luca
Gisbert, Hector
Sørensen, Philip
contents It has been recently claimed that the axion coupling to fermions is responsible for an oscillating electric dipole moment (EDM) in the background of axion dark matter. In this work, we re-examine the derivation of this effect. Contrary to previous studies, we point out the physical relevance of an axion boundary term, which is crucial in restoring the axion shift symmetry and drastically affects the EDM phenomenology. To describe the latter, we introduce the notion of a time-averaged effective axion EDM, which encodes the boundary term and whose magnitude depends on the oscillation regime. For slow oscillations, the boundary term washes out the standard oscillating EDM, resulting in an exact cancellation in the static limit. Conversely, during fast oscillations, the boundary term amplifies the effective EDM relatively to the standard EDM contribution. This observable is especially interesting in the case of the electron EDM. For an $\mathcal{O}(1)$ axion-electron coupling, the overall size of the effective EDM in the regime of intermediate or fast oscillations is comparable to the present static EDM limit.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2308_16135
institution arXiv
publishDate 2023
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle On the oscillating electric dipole moment induced by axion-fermion couplings
Di Luzio, Luca
Gisbert, Hector
Sørensen, Philip
High Energy Physics - Phenomenology
High Energy Physics - Experiment
It has been recently claimed that the axion coupling to fermions is responsible for an oscillating electric dipole moment (EDM) in the background of axion dark matter. In this work, we re-examine the derivation of this effect. Contrary to previous studies, we point out the physical relevance of an axion boundary term, which is crucial in restoring the axion shift symmetry and drastically affects the EDM phenomenology. To describe the latter, we introduce the notion of a time-averaged effective axion EDM, which encodes the boundary term and whose magnitude depends on the oscillation regime. For slow oscillations, the boundary term washes out the standard oscillating EDM, resulting in an exact cancellation in the static limit. Conversely, during fast oscillations, the boundary term amplifies the effective EDM relatively to the standard EDM contribution. This observable is especially interesting in the case of the electron EDM. For an $\mathcal{O}(1)$ axion-electron coupling, the overall size of the effective EDM in the regime of intermediate or fast oscillations is comparable to the present static EDM limit.
title On the oscillating electric dipole moment induced by axion-fermion couplings
topic High Energy Physics - Phenomenology
High Energy Physics - Experiment
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2308.16135