30 research outputs found
Probing neutrino physics with a self-consistent treatment of the weak decoupling, nucleosynthesis, and photon decoupling epochs
We show that a self-consistent and coupled treatment of the weak decoupling,
big bang nucleosynthesis, and photon decoupling epochs can be used to provide
new insights and constraints on neutrino sector physics from high-precision
measurements of light element abundances and cosmic microwave background
observables. Implications of beyond-standard-model physics in cosmology,
especially within the neutrino sector, are assessed by comparing predictions
against five observables: the baryon energy density, helium abundance,
deuterium abundance, effective number of neutrinos, and sum of the light
neutrino mass eigenstates. We give examples for constraints on dark radiation,
neutrino rest mass, lepton numbers, and scenarios for light and heavy sterile
neutrinos.Comment: 29 pages, 10 figure
Neutrino energy transport in weak decoupling and big bang nucleosynthesis
We calculate the evolution of the early universe through the epochs of weak
decoupling, weak freeze-out and big bang nucleosynthesis (BBN) by
simultaneously coupling a full strong, electromagnetic, and weak nuclear
reaction network with a multi-energy group Boltzmann neutrino energy transport
scheme. The modular structure of our code provides the ability to dissect the
relative contributions of each process responsible for evolving the dynamics of
the early universe in the absence of neutrino flavor oscillations. Such an
approach allows a detailed accounting of the evolution of the ,
, , , , energy
distribution functions alongside and self-consistently with the nuclear
reactions and entropy/heat generation and flow between the neutrino and
photon/electron/positron/baryon plasma components. This calculation reveals
nonlinear feedback in the time evolution of neutrino distribution functions and
plasma thermodynamic conditions (e.g., electron-positron pair densities), with
implications for: the phasing between scale factor and plasma temperature; the
neutron-to-proton ratio; light-element abundance histories; and the
cosmological parameter \neff. We find that our approach of following the time
development of neutrino spectral distortions and concomitant entropy production
and extraction from the plasma results in changes in the computed value of the
BBN deuterium yield. For example, for particular implementations of quantum
corrections in plasma thermodynamics, our calculations show a increase
in deuterium. These changes are potentially significant in the context of
anticipated improvements in observational and nuclear physics uncertainties.Comment: 37 pages, 12 Figures, 6 Table
Using Big Bang Nucleosynthesis to Extend CMB Probes of Neutrino Physics
We present calculations showing that upcoming Cosmic Microwave Background
(CMB) experiments will have the power to improve on current constraints on
neutrino masses and provide new limits on neutrino degeneracy parameters. The
latter could surpass those derived from Big Bang Nucleosynthesis (BBN) and the
observationally-inferred primordial helium abundance. These conclusions derive
from our Monte Carlo Markov Chain (MCMC) simulations which incorporate a full
BBN nuclear reaction network. This provides a self-consistent treatment of the
helium abundance, the baryon number, the three individual neutrino degeneracy
parameters and other cosmological parameters. Our analysis focuses on the
effects of gravitational lensing on CMB constraints on neutrino rest mass and
degeneracy parameter. We find for the PLANCK experiment that total (summed)
neutrino mass eV could be ruled out at or better.
Likewise neutrino degeneracy parameters and could be detected or ruled out at
confidence, or better. For POLARBEAR we find that the corresponding detectable
values are , , and , while for EPIC we obtain ,
, and . Our forcast for
EPIC demonstrates that CMB observations have the potential to set constraints
on neutrino degeneracy parameters which are better than BBN-derived limits and
an order of magnitude better than current WMAP-derived limits.Comment: 27 pages, 11 figures, matches published version in JCA
Light Element Signatures of Sterile Neutrinos and Cosmological Lepton Numbers
We study primordial nucleosynthesis abundance yields for assumed ranges of cosmological lepton numbers, sterile neutrino mass-squared differences and active-sterile vacuum mixing angles. We fix the baryon-to-photon ratio at the value derived from the cosmic microwave background (CMB) data and then calculate the deviation of the 2H, 4He, and 7Li abundance yields from those expected in the zero lepton number(s), no-new-neutrino-physics case. We conclude that high precision (< 5% error) measurements of the primordial 2H abundance from, e.g., QSO absorption line observations coupled with high precision (< 1% error) baryon density measurements from the CMB could have the power to either: (1) reveal or rule out the existence of a light sterile neutrino if the sign of the cosmological lepton number is known; or (2) place strong constraints on lepton numbers, sterile neutrino mixing properties and resonance sweep physics. Similar conclusions would hold if the primordial 4He abundance could be determined to better than 10%
Coherent Active-Sterile Neutrino Flavor Transformation in the Early Universe
We solve the problem of coherent Mikheyev-Smirnov-Wolfenstein (MSW) resonant
active-to-sterile neutrino flavor conversion driven by an initial lepton number
in the early universe. We find incomplete destruction of lepton number in this
process and a sterile neutrino energy distribution with a distinctive cusp and
high energy tail. These features imply alteration of the non-zero lepton number
primordial nucleosynthesis paradigm when there exist sterile neutrinos with
rest masses ~ 1 eV. This could result in better light element probes of
(constraints on) these particles.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figures, matches version printed in PR
Sterile neutrino dark matter as a consequence of nuMSM-induced lepton asymmetry
It has been pointed out in ref.[1] that in the nuMSM (Standard Model extended
by three right-handed neutrinos with masses smaller than the electroweak
scale), there is a corner in the parameter space where CP-violating resonant
oscillations among the two heaviest right-handed neutrinos continue to operate
below the freeze-out temperature of sphaleron transitions, leading to a lepton
asymmetry which is considerably larger than the baryon asymmetry. Consequently,
the lightest right-handed (``sterile'') neutrinos, which may serve as dark
matter, are generated through an efficient resonant mechanism proposed by Shi
and Fuller [2]. We re-compute the dark matter relic density and non-equilibrium
momentum distribution function in this situation with quantum field theoretic
methods and, confronting the results with existing astrophysical data, derive
bounds on the properties of the lightest right-handed neutrinos. Our spectra
can be used as an input for structure formation simulations in warm dark matter
cosmologies, for a Lyman-alpha analysis of the dark matter distribution on
small scales, and for studying the properties of haloes of dwarf spheroidal
galaxies.Comment: 25 pages. v2: many clarifications and references added; published
versio
Effect of neutrino rest mass on ionization equilibrium freeze-out
We show how small neutrino rest masses can increase the expansion rate near the photon decoupling epoch in the early Universe, causing an earlier, higher temperature freeze-out for ionization equilibrium compared to the massless neutrino case. This yields a larger free-electron fraction, thereby affecting the photon diffusion length differently than the sound horizon at photon decoupling. This neutrino-mass and recombination effect depends strongly on the neutrino rest masses. Though below current sensitivity, this effect could be probed by next-generation cosmic microwave background experiments, giving another observational handle on neutrino rest mass