Dynamical Stabilization of the Fermi Scale: Phase Diagram of Strongly Coupled Theories for (Minimal) Walking Technicolor and Unparticles

We summarize basic features associated to dynamical breaking of the electroweak symmetry. The knowledge of the phase diagram of strongly coupled theories as function of the number of colors, flavors and matter representation plays a fundamental role when trying to construct viable extensions of the standard model (SM). Therefore we will report on the status of the phase diagram for SU(N) gauge theories with fermionic matter transforming according to arbitrary representations of the underlying gauge group. We will discuss how the phase diagram can be used to construct unparticle models. We will then review Minimal Walking Technicolor (MWT) and other extensions, such as partially gauged and split technicolor. MWT is a sufficiently general, symmetry wise, model to be considered as a benchmark for any model aiming at breaking the electroweak symmetry dynamically. The unification of the standard model gauge couplings will be revisited within technicolor extensions of the SM. A number of appendices are added to review some basic methods and to provide useful details. In one of the appendices we will show how to gain information on the spectrum of strongly coupled theories relevant for new extensions of the SM by introducing and using alternative large N limits.