Sterile Neutrino Dark Matter Cries for GeV Heavy Neutral Leptons
Abstract
The ordinary and dark matter in the Universe may share a common origin in the framework of a minimal extension of the Standard Model by three right-handed neutrinos. A pair of such heavy neutral leptons (HNLs) can give masses to neutrinos, generate the baryon asymmetry at the electroweak scale and produce a large lepton asymmetry at the QCD scale, which is then resonantly transformed into an abundance of the third state that acts as sterile neutrino dark matter. The minimality of this setup, known as Neutrino Minimal Standard Model (νMSM), makes it highly predictive. Earlier attempts to pin down the properties of the HNLs based on the requirement to simultaneously explain the neutrino masses as well as the baryonic and dark matter abundances were hampered by an incomplete understanding of the quantum kinetic equations describing the HNLs throughout cosmic history. We perform the first parameter scan of the νMSM in which this shortcoming has been overcome. We find that the νMSM provides a common explanation for all aforementioned phenomena only within a well-defined parameter space that is limited in all directions, with HNL masses kinematically accessible by the SHiP experiment as well as searches at the LHC and future lepton colliders. Further predictions for the HNL decay branching ratios, CP-violation, and lepton number violation (LNV) make the model highly testable, bringing a discovery of the common origin of neutrino masses and all matter in the Universe within reach of existing and planned experiments.
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BibTeX
@misc{drewes2026sterile,
title = {{Sterile Neutrino Dark Matter Cries for GeV Heavy Neutral Leptons}},
author = {Marco Drewes and Yannis Georis and Juraj Klarić and Mikhail Shaposhnikov and Inar Timiryasov},
howpublished = {arXiv},
year = {2026},
month = sep,
doi = {10.48550/arxiv.2609.28457},
eprint = {2609.28457},
archivePrefix = {arXiv},
url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.28457},
}
RIS
TY - UNPB
TI - Sterile Neutrino Dark Matter Cries for GeV Heavy Neutral Leptons
AU - Marco Drewes
AU - Yannis Georis
AU - Juraj Klarić
AU - Mikhail Shaposhnikov
AU - Inar Timiryasov
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/09/23
PB - arXiv
DO - 10.48550/arxiv.2609.28457
UR - https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.28457
AB - The ordinary and dark matter in the Universe may share a common origin in the framework of a minimal extension of the Standard Model by three right-handed neutrinos. A pair of such heavy neutral leptons (HNLs) can give masses to neutrinos, generate the baryon asymmetry at the electroweak scale and produce a large lepton asymmetry at the QCD scale, which is then resonantly transformed into an abundance of the third state that acts as sterile neutrino dark matter. The minimality of this setup, known as Neutrino Minimal Standard Model (νMSM), makes it highly predictive. Earlier attempts to pin down the properties of the HNLs based on the requirement to simultaneously explain the neutrino masses as well as the baryonic and dark matter abundances were hampered by an incomplete understanding of the quantum kinetic equations describing the HNLs throughout cosmic history. We perform the first parameter scan of the νMSM in which this shortcoming has been overcome. We find that the νMSM provides a common explanation for all aforementioned phenomena only within a well-defined parameter space that is limited in all directions, with HNL masses kinematically accessible by the SHiP experiment as well as searches at the LHC and future lepton colliders. Further predictions for the HNL decay branching ratios, CP-violation, and lepton number violation (LNV) make the model highly testable, bringing a discovery of the common origin of neutrino masses and all matter in the Universe within reach of existing and planned experiments.
ER -