Axion-Assisted Production of Sterile Neutrino Dark Matter

TL;DR

This paper proposes a new mechanism where axion-like fields dynamically suppress sterile neutrino decay, enabling them to be viable dark matter candidates despite previous observational constraints.

Contribution

It introduces a model where the sterile-active neutrino mixing angle is dynamically induced by an axion-like field, reducing decay rates and evading existing observational bounds.

Findings

The model suppresses sterile neutrino decay, aligning with X-ray and gamma-ray constraints.

The framework links QCD axions to sterile neutrino production in the early universe.

Demonstrates a viable alternative to standard sterile neutrino dark matter scenarios.

Abstract

Sterile neutrinos can be generated in the early universe through oscillations with active neutrinos and represent a popular and well-studied candidate for our universe's dark matter. Stringent constraints from X-ray and gamma-ray line searches, however, have excluded the simplest of such models. In this letter, we propose a novel alternative to the standard scenario in which the mixing angle between the sterile and active neutrinos is a dynamical quantity, induced through interactions with a light axion-like field. As the energy density of the axion-like particles is diluted by Hubble expansion, the degree of mixing is reduced at late times, suppressing the decay rate and easily alleviating any tension with X-ray or gamma-ray constraints. We present a simple model which illustrates the phenomenology of this scenario, and also describe a framework in which the QCD axion is responsible for the production of sterile neutrinos in the early universe.