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Title: Thermal production of ultrarelativistic right-handed neutrinos: complete leading-order results

Journal Article · · Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics
;  [1]
  1. Fakultät für Physik, Universität Bielefeld, D-33615 Bielefeld (Germany)

The thermal production of relativistic right-handed Majorana neutrinos is of importance for models of thermal leptogenesis in the early Universe. Right-handed neutrinos can be produced both by 1↔2 decay or inverse decay and by 2 → 2 scattering processes. In a previous publication we have studied the production via 1↔2 (inverse) decay processes. There we have shown that multiple scattering mediated by soft gauge boson exchange also contributes to the production rate at leading order and gives a strong enhancement. Here we complete the leading order calculation by adding 2 → 2 scattering processes involving either electroweak gauge bosons or third-generation quarks. We find that processes with gauge interactions give the most important contributions. We also obtain a new sum rule for the Hard Thermal Loop resummed fermion propagator.

OSTI ID:
22279764
Journal Information:
Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics, Vol. 2012, Issue 03; Other Information: Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); ISSN 1475-7516
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English

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