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arXiv · 0911.3168

Interaction of Neutrinos with a Cosmological K-essence Scalar

Christopher S. Gauthier·Ryo Saotome·Ratindranath Akhoury
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Abstract

In this paper we study a novel means of coupling neutrinos to a Lorentz violating background k-essence field. We first look into the effect that k-essence has on the neutrino dispersion relation and derive a general formula for the neutrino velocity in the presence on a k-essence background. The influence of k-essence coupling on neutrino oscillations is then considered. It is found that a non-diagonal k-essence coupling leads to an oscillation length that goes like λ\sim E^{-1} where E is the energy. This should be contrasted with the λ\sim E dependence seen in the standard mass-induced mechanism of neutrino oscillations. While such a scenario is not favored experimentally, it places constraints on the interactions of the neutrino with a cosmological k-essence scalar background by requiring it to be flavor diagonal. All non-trivial physical effects discussed here require the speed of sound to be different from the speed of light and hence are primarily a consequence of Lorentz violation.

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Christopher S. Gauthier, Ryo Saotome, Ratindranath Akhoury. 2009-11-16. Interaction of Neutrinos with a Cosmological K-essence Scalar. https://doi.org/10.1007/jhep07(2010)062

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