skip to main content
OSTI.GOV title logo U.S. Department of Energy
Office of Scientific and Technical Information

Title: Sterile Neutrinos, Dark Matter, and Pulsar Velocities in Models with a Higgs Singlet

Abstract

We identify the range of parameters for which the sterile neutrinos can simultaneously explain the cosmological dark matter and the observed velocities of pulsars. To satisfy all cosmological bounds, the relic sterile neutrinos must be produced sufficiently cold. This is possible in a class of models with a gauge-singlet Higgs boson coupled to the neutrinos. Sterile dark matter can be detected by the x-ray telescopes. The presence of the singlet in the Higgs sector can be tested at the CERN Large Hadron Collider.

Authors:
 [1]
+ Show Author Affiliations
  1. Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of California, Los Angeles, California 90095-1547 (United States)
Publication Date:
OSTI Identifier:
20861468
Resource Type:
Journal Article
Resource Relation:
Journal Name: Physical Review Letters; Journal Volume: 97; Journal Issue: 24; Other Information: DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.97.241301; (c) 2006 The American Physical Society; Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Subject:
72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS; CERN LHC; HIGGS BOSONS; HIGGS MODEL; NEUTRINOS; NONLUMINOUS MATTER; PULSARS; TELESCOPES

Citation Formats

Kusenko, Alexander. Sterile Neutrinos, Dark Matter, and Pulsar Velocities in Models with a Higgs Singlet. United States: N. p., 2006. Web. doi:10.1103/PHYSREVLETT.97.241301.
Copy to clipboard
Kusenko, Alexander. Sterile Neutrinos, Dark Matter, and Pulsar Velocities in Models with a Higgs Singlet. United States. doi:10.1103/PHYSREVLETT.97.241301.
Copy to clipboard
Kusenko, Alexander. Fri . "Sterile Neutrinos, Dark Matter, and Pulsar Velocities in Models with a Higgs Singlet". United States. doi:10.1103/PHYSREVLETT.97.241301.
Copy to clipboard
@article{osti_20861468,
title = {Sterile Neutrinos, Dark Matter, and Pulsar Velocities in Models with a Higgs Singlet},
author = {Kusenko, Alexander},
abstractNote = {We identify the range of parameters for which the sterile neutrinos can simultaneously explain the cosmological dark matter and the observed velocities of pulsars. To satisfy all cosmological bounds, the relic sterile neutrinos must be produced sufficiently cold. This is possible in a class of models with a gauge-singlet Higgs boson coupled to the neutrinos. Sterile dark matter can be detected by the x-ray telescopes. The presence of the singlet in the Higgs sector can be tested at the CERN Large Hadron Collider.},
doi = {10.1103/PHYSREVLETT.97.241301},
journal = {Physical Review Letters},
number = 24,
volume = 97,
place = {United States},
year = {Fri Dec 15 00:00:00 EST 2006},
month = {Fri Dec 15 00:00:00 EST 2006}
}
Copy to clipboard
Journal Article:
DOI:  10.1103/PHYSREVLETT.97.241301
Other availability
Find in Google Scholar Find in Google Scholar
Search WorldCat Search WorldCat to find libraries that may hold this journal
Save / Share:
Export Metadata
Save to My Library
You must Sign In or Create an Account in order to save documents to your library.

  • ; - Physical Review. D, Particles Fields
    Sterile neutrino with mass of several keV can be the cosmological dark matter, can explain the observed velocities of pulsars, and can play an important role in the formation of the first stars. We describe the production of sterile neutrinos in a model with an extended Higgs sector, in which the Majorana mass term is generated by the vacuum expectation value of a gauge-singlet Higgs boson. In this model the relic abundance of sterile neutrinos does not necessarily depend on their mixing angles, the free-streaming length can be much smaller than in the case of warm dark matter produced bymore » neutrino oscillations, and, therefore, some of the previously quoted bounds do not apply. The presence of the gauge singlet in the Higgs sector has important implications for the electroweak phase transition, baryogenesis, and the upcoming experiments at the Large Hadron Collider and a Linear Collider.« less

  • ; ; - Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics
    We construct a flavor symmetry model based on the tetrahedral group A{sub 4} in which the right-handed neutrinos from the seesaw mechanism can be both keV warm dark matter particles and eV-scale sterile neutrinos. This is achieved by giving the right-handed neutrinos appropriate charges under the same Froggatt-Nielsen symmetry responsible for the hierarchy of the charged lepton masses. We discuss the effect of next-to-leading order corrections to deviate the zeroth order tri-bimaximal mixing. Those corrections have two sources: (i) higher order seesaw terms, which are important when the seesaw particles are eV-scale, and (ii) higher-dimensional effective operators suppressed by additionalmore » powers of the cut-off scale of the theory. Whereas the mixing angles of the active neutrinos typically receive corrections of the same order, the mixing of the sterile neutrinos with the active ones is rather stable as it is connected with a hierarchy of mass scales. We also modify an effective A{sub 4} model to incorporate keV-scale sterile neutrinos.« less

  • ; - Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics
    We perform a detailed and illustrative study of the production of keV sterile neutrino Dark Matter (DM) by decays of singlet scalars in the early Universe. In the current study we focus on providing a clear and general overview of this production mechanism. For the first time we study all regimes possible on the level of momentum distribution functions, which we obtain by solving a system of Boltzmann equations. These quantities contain the full information about the production process, which allows us to not only track the evolution of the DM generation but to also take into account all boundsmore » related to the spectrum, such as constraints from structure formation or from avoiding too much dark radiation. In particular we show that this simple production mechanism can, depending on the regime, lead to strongly non-thermal DM spectra which may even feature more than one peak in the momentum distribution. These cases could have particularly interesting consequences for cosmological structure formation, as their analysis requires more refined tools than the simplistic estimate using the free-streaming horizon. Here we present the mechanism including all concepts and subtleties involved, for now using the assumption that the effective number of relativistic degrees of freedom is constant during DM production, which is applicable in a significant fraction of the parameter space. This allows us to derive analytical results to back up our detailed numerical computations, thus leading to the most comprehensive picture of keV sterile neutrino DM production by singlet scalar decays that exists up to now.« less

  • ; - Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics
    We perform a detailed and illustrative study of the production of keV sterile neutrino Dark Matter (DM) by decays of singlet scalars in the early Universe. In the current study we focus on providing a clear and general overview of this production mechanism. For the first time we study all regimes possible on the level of momentum distribution functions, which we obtain by solving a system of Boltzmann equations. These quantities contain the full information about the production process, which allows us to not only track the evolution of the DM generation but to also take into account all boundsmore » related to the spectrum, such as constraints from structure formation or from avoiding too much dark radiation. In particular we show that this simple production mechanism can, depending on the regime, lead to strongly non-thermal DM spectra which may even feature more than one peak in the momentum distribution. These cases could have particularly interesting consequences for cosmological structure formation, as their analysis requires more refined tools than the simplistic estimate using the free-streaming horizon. Here we present the mechanism including all concepts and subtleties involved, for now using the assumption that the effective number of relativistic degrees of freedom is constant during DM production, which is applicable in a significant fraction of the parameter space. This allows us to derive analytical results to back up our detailed numerical computations, thus leading to the most comprehensive picture of keV sterile neutrino DM production by singlet scalar decays that exists up to now.« less

  • ; ; - Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics
    We investigate the early Universe production of sterile neutrino Dark Matter by the decays of singlet scalars. All previous studies applied simplifying assumptions and/or studied the process only on the level of number densities, which makes it impossible to give statements about cosmic structure formation. We overcome these issues by dropping all simplifying assumptions (except for one we showed earlier to work perfectly) and by computing the full course of Dark Matter production on the level of non-thermal momentum distribution functions. We are thus in the position to study a broad range of aspects of the resulting settings and applymore » a broad set of bounds in a reliable manner. We have a particular focus on how to incorporate bounds from structure formation on the level of the linear power spectrum, since the simplistic estimate using the free-streaming horizon clearly fails for highly non-thermal distributions. Our work comprises the most detailed and comprehensive study of sterile neutrino Dark Matter production by scalar decays presented so far.« less