The C$\nu$B energy density through the quantum measurement theory

TL;DR

This paper uses quantum measurement theory to analyze the cosmological neutrino background, deriving bounds on neutrino energy density and confirming that it results from a coherent sum of mass eigenstates.

Contribution

It introduces a novel application of quantum measurement concepts to cosmological neutrino properties, providing theoretical bounds on their energy density.

Findings

Neutrino energy density is a coherent sum of mass eigenstates.

Results align with quantum mechanics principles for neutrino hierarchies.

Constraints on effective neutrino mass influence cosmological energy density estimates.

Abstract

We apply concepts from the quantum measurement theory to obtain some cosmological neutrino background (C$\nu$B) properties and discuss their relevance in defining theoretical bounds on cosmological neutrino energy density. Describing three neutrino generations as a composite quantum system through the generalized theory of quantum measurement provides us with the probabilistic correlation between observable energies and neutrino flavor eigenstates. By observing that flavor-averaged and flavor-weighted energies are the quantum observables respectively generated by selective and non-selective quantum measurement schemes, it is possible to identify the constraints on the effective mass value expression that determines the neutrino contribution to the energy density of the cosmic inventory. Our results agree with the quantum mechanics viewpoint that asserts that the cosmological neutrino energy density is obtained from a coherent sum of mass eigenstate energies, for normal and inverted mass hierarchies.