Collective flavor conversions are interactions of neutrinos with quantized flavor waves

Abstract

Collective oscillations in dense neutrino gases (flavor waves) are notable for their instabilities that cause fast flavor conversion. We develop a quantum theory of interacting neutrinos and flavor wave quanta, which are analogous to plasmons, but also carry flavor. The emission or absorption of such flavor plasmons $\psi$, or flavomons, changes the neutrino flavor. When an angular crossing occurs, the process ${\nu }_{\mu }\to {\nu }_e+\psi$ is more rapid than its inverse along the direction of the crossing, triggering stimulated $\psi$ emission and fast instability. Calculating the rate via Feynman diagrams matches the fast instability growth rate. Our novel $\nu$ and $\psi$ kinetic equations, corresponding to quasi-linear theory, describe instability evolution without resolving the small scales of the flavomon wavelength, potentially overcoming the main challenge of fast flavor evolution.

Matching version published on PRL; 5 pages, 1 figures, plus Supplemental Material

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Cited by in corpus (5)

• Impact of Neutrino Flavor Conversions on Neutron Star Merger Dynamics, Ejecta, Nucleosynthesis, and Multi-Messenger Signals
• Testing common approximations of neutrino fast flavor conversion
• Single-wave solutions of the neutrino fast flavor system. Part I. Mechanical properties
• Supernova $\nu$ flavour conversions in DUNE: the slow, the fast and the standard
• Single-wave solutions of the neutrino fast flavor system. Part II. Weak instabilities and their resonant behavior