Fermion stabilisation of extra dimensions and natural mass hierarchies

Casimir forces from fermions in an extra dimension can stabilise Randall-Sundrum models. Contrary to previous expectations, the stabilisation can produce large electroweak hierarchies without fine tuning. The Casimir stabilisation occurs in the same five-dimensional fermion models which have been found to give the observed fermion mass hierarchies. This is shown for masses generated by the Higgs mechanism and by a Higgsless symmetry breaking mechanism, where new light Kaluza-Klein states are presented