Modified big bang nucleosynthesis with non-standard neutron sources

Abstract

During big bang nucleosynthesis, any injection of extra neutrons around the time of the ${}^7$Be formation, i.e. at a temperature of order $T\simeq 50$~keV, can reduce the predicted freeze-out amount of ${}^7$Be + ${}^7$Li that otherwise remains in sharp contradiction with the Spite plateau value inferred from the observations of Pop II stars. However, the growing confidence in the primordial D/H determinations puts a strong constraint on any such scenario. We address this issue in detail, analyzing different temporal patterns of neutron injection, such as decay, annihilation, resonant annihilation, and oscillation between mirror and standard model world neutrons. For this latter case, we derive the realistic injection pattern taking into account thermal effects (damping and refraction) in the primordial plasma. If the extra neutron supply is the sole non-standard mechanism operating during the BBN, the suppression of lithium abundance below Li/H~$\le 1.9\times 10^{-10}$ always leads to the overproduction of deuterium, D/H~$\ge 3.6\times 10^{-5}$, well outside the error bars suggested by recent observations.

10 pages, 9 figures

References in corpus (19)

• The Primordial Lithium Problem
• A probable stellar solution to the cosmological lithium discrepancy
• Particle physics catalysis of thermal Big Bang Nucleosynthesis
• Big Bang Nucleosynthesis as a Probe of New Physics
• Neutron -- Mirror Neutron Oscillation: How Fast Might It Be?
• Neutron lifetime measurements using gravitationally trapped ultracold neutrons
• Experimental search for neutron - mirror neutron oscillations using storage of ultracold neutrons
• More about neutron - mirror neutron oscillation
• Primordial Lithium Abundance in Catalyzed Big Bang Nucleosynthesis
• Fast Neutron - Mirror Neutron Oscillation and Ultra High Energy Cosmic Rays
• Possible solution to the ${}^7$Li problem by the long lived stau
• Resonant Destruction as a Possible Solution to the Cosmological Lithium Problem
• Gravitino Dark Matter and the Cosmic Lithium Abundances
• Metastable GeV-scale particles as a solution to the cosmological lithium problem
• Solving the cosmic lithium problems with primordial late-decaying particles
• Nuclear Reaction Uncertainties, Massive Gravitino Decays and the Cosmological Lithium Problem
• Revised Big Bang Nucleosynthesis with long-lived negatively charged massive particles: updated recombination rates, primordial 9Be nucleosynthesis, and impact of new 6Li limits
• General limit on the relation between abundances of D and ${}^7$Li in big bang nucleosynthesis with nucleon injections
• Thermodynamics of the early Universe with mirror dark matter

Cited by in corpus (8)

• A new tension in the cosmological model from primordial deuterium?
• Primordial nucleosynthesis
• Constraining cosmic scatter in the Galactic halo through a differential analysis of metal-poor stars
• Relic Neutrino Freeze-out: Dependence on Natural Constants
• Probing the braneworld hypothesis with a neutron-shining-through-a-wall experiment
• A search for neutron to mirror neutron oscillation using neutron electric dipole moment measurements
• Primordial Nucleosynthesis
• Effects of transient non-thermal particles on the big bang nucleosynthesis