Neutrino Sector with Majorana Mass Terms and Friedberg-Lee Symmetry

TL;DR

This paper explores a Friedberg-Lee symmetry in a neutrino model with right-handed neutrinos, revealing that one neutrino decouples and another remains massless, offering insights into neutrino lightness.

Contribution

It introduces a novel application of Friedberg-Lee symmetry to neutrino mass generation, highlighting the special role of right-handed neutrinos and their potential decoupling.

Findings

One right-handed neutrino decouples and interacts only gravitationally.

The model predicts a massless, interacting neutrino.

The symmetry limit implies neutrinos are massless.

Abstract

We examine a recently proposed symmetry/condition by Friedberg and Lee in the framework where three right-handed neutrinos are added to the spectrum of the three-family Minimal Standard Model. It is found that the right-handed neutrinos are very special, with respect to this symmetry. In the symmetry limit the neutrinos are massless and that may be a hint about why they are light. Imposed as a condition and not as a full symmetry, we find that one of the three right-handed neutrinos simply decouples (has only gravitational interactions) and that there is a massless interacting neutrino. The possible relation of the model to the see-saw mechanism is briefly discussed.