Astrophysical Neutrinos and Flavor Evolution With Self Interaction

TL;DR

This paper explores how collective neutrino oscillations in supernovae, influenced by initial conditions, affect flavor evolution and potentially impact heavy element formation.

Contribution

It systematically studies nonlinear neutrino flavor evolution across different proto-neutron star models, highlighting the importance of initial conditions.

Findings

Collective neutrino oscillations significantly alter flavor distributions.

Initial conditions critically influence oscillation outcomes.

Potential implications for nucleosynthesis in supernovae.

Abstract

In a core collapse supernova, collective oscillations of neutrinos emitted by the proto-neutron star significantly modifies the partition of energy between different flavors in a way which is potentially important for the nucleosynthesis of heavy elements at the outer layers. As the outcome of collective oscillations depends nonlinearly on the chosen initial conditions proto-neutron star, their systematical study across the proto-neutron star model space may provide answers to some key questions.