Limits on Active-Sterile Neutrino Mixing and the Primordial Deuterium Abundance

Abstract

Studies of limits on active-sterile neutrino mixing derived from big bang nucleosynthesis considerations are extended to consider the dependance of these constraints on the primordial deuterium abundance. This study is motivated by recent measurements of D/H in quasar absorption systems, which at present yield discordant results. Limits on active-sterile mixing are somewhat relaxed for high D/H. For low D/H ($\approx 2\times 10^{-5}$), no active-sterile neutrino mixing is allowed by currently popular upper limits on the primordial ${}^4$He abundance $Y$. For such low primordial D/H values, the observational inference of active-sterile neutrino mixing by upcoming solar neutrino experiments would imply that $Y$ has been systematically underestimated, unless there is new physics not included in standard BBN.

10 pages + 2 figures, uses revtex macros, submitted to Phys. Rev. D. Corrected figure captions and an added reference

References in corpus (18)

• Particle Physics with High Energy Neutrinos
• Big-Bang Nucleosynthesis and the Baryon Density of the Universe
• Neutrino physics and the mirror world: how exact parity symmetry explains the solar neutrino deficit, the atmospheric neutrino anomaly and the LSND experiment
• Reconciling Present Neutrino Puzzles: Sterile Neutrinos as Mirror Neutrinos
• Big Bang Nucleosynthesis in Crisis?
• Large neutrino asymmetries from neutrino oscillations
• Reconciling sterile neutrinos with big bang nucleosynthesis
• Confirmation of high deuterium abundance in QSO absorbers
• Models of Light Singlet Fermion and Neutrino Phenomenology
• Refined Big Bang Nucleosynthesis Constraints on ${\Omega }_{Baryon}$ and $N_{\nu }$
• THE SOLAR NEUTRINO PROBLEM
• Model of Four Light Neutrinos in the Light of All Present Data
• Can a ``natural'' three-generation neutrino mixing scheme satisfy everything?
• Testing the Vacuum Oscillation and the MSW Solutions of the Solar Neutrino Problem
• Do experiments and astrophysical considerations suggest an inverted neutrino mass hierarchy?
• Big Bang Nucleosynthesis: An Update
• ARE THERE STERILE NEUTRINOS IN THE FLUX OF SOLAR NEUTRINOS ON THE EARTH?
• Possible Revelation of Seesaw Mass Pattern in Solar and Atmospheric Neutrino Data

Cited by in corpus (15)

• Big Bang nucleosynthesis and physics beyond the Standard Model
• Variations on Four-Neutrino Oscillations
• Relic neutrino asymmetry evolution from first principles
• Four-Way Neutrino Oscillations
• Is Zee Model The Model of Neutrino Masses?
• Axion constraints in non-standard thermal histories
• Neutrino Mixing, CP/T Violation and Textures in Four-Neutrino Models
• Implications of mirror neutrinos for early universe cosmology
• Cosmological nucleosynthesis and active-sterile neutrino oscillations with small mass differences: The resonant case
• Further studies on relic neutrino asymmetry generation I: the adiabatic Boltzmann limit, non-adiabatic evolution, and the classical harmonic oscillator analogue of the quantum kinetic equations
• Implications of the ${\nu }_{\mu }\to {\nu }_s$ solution to the atmospheric neutrino anomaly for early Universe cosmology
• Three Neutrino $\Delta m^2$ scales and Singular Seesaw Mechanism
• Imprint of Sterile Neutrinos in the Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation
• Pseudo-Dirac neutrinos as a potential complete solution to the neutrino oscillation puzzle
• Big Bang Nucleosynthesis and Active-Sterile Neutrino Mixing: Evidence for Maximal Mu Neutrino <-> Tau Neutrino Mixing in Super Kamiokande?