Nucleosynthesis confronts an unstable, inert 17-keV state

Journal Article · Mon Feb 10 00:00:00 EST 1992 · Physical Review Letters; (United States)

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.68.744· OSTI ID:5083378

Enqvist, K; Kainulainen, K ^[1]; Thomson, M ^[2]

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1. NORDITA, Blegdamsvej 17, DK-2100 Copenhagen O (Denmark)
2. Department of Theoretical Physics, University of Manchester, Manchester M139PL (United Kingdom)

We study the cosmological consequences of an inert 17-keV state mixing with the electron neutrino. We find that the nucleosynthesis upper bound on the primordial helium abundance prohibits the existence of such a state, unless its lifetime falls into the range 6{times}10{sup {minus}4}{approx lt}{tau}{sub vac}{approx lt}2{times}10{sup {minus}2} s. In this range the decay occurs after the chemical decoupling of the electron neutrinos and before the beginning of the nucleosynthesis, with the result that the predicted helium abundance can be lower than what it would be in the standard scenario.

• OSTI ID: 5083378
• Journal Information: Physical Review Letters; (United States), Vol. 68:6; ISSN 0031-9007
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS
COSMOLOGY
NUCLEOSYNTHESIS
NEUTRINO OSCILLATION
HELIUM
LIFETIME
LIMITING VALUES
PARAMETRIC ANALYSIS
PHASE TRANSFORMATIONS
QUANTUM CHROMODYNAMICS
TEMPERATURE DEPENDENCE
ELEMENTS
FIELD THEORIES
FLUIDS
GASES
NONMETALS
QUANTUM FIELD THEORY
RARE GASES
SYNTHESIS
662430* - Properties of Leptons- (1992-)
662230 - Quantum Chromodynamics- (1992-)