Improved big bang nucleosynthesis constraints on heavy neutral leptons

We constrain the lifetime of thermally produced heavy neutral leptons (HNLs) from big bang nucleosynthesis. We show that even a small fraction of mesons present in the primeval plasma leads to the overproduction of primordial helium-4. This constrains the lifetime of HNLs to be τN< 0.02     s for...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Physical review. D 2021-07, Vol.104 (2), p.1, Article 023517
Main Authors: Boyarsky, A., Ovchynnikov, M., Ruchayskiy, O., Syvolap, V.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Big bang cosmology
Leptons
Lower bounds
Mesons
Nuclear fusion
Nuclei (nuclear physics)
Pions
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Summary:We constrain the lifetime of thermally produced heavy neutral leptons (HNLs) from big bang nucleosynthesis. We show that even a small fraction of mesons present in the primeval plasma leads to the overproduction of primordial helium-4. This constrains the lifetime of HNLs to be τN< 0.02     s for masses above the mass of the pion (as compared to 0.1 s reported previously). In combination with accelerator searches, this allows us to put a new lower bound on the HNL masses and define the "bottom line" for HNL searches at the future Intensity Frontier experiments.
ISSN:2470-0010
2470-0029
DOI:10.1103/PhysRevD.104.023517