Potential Impact of Fast Flavor Oscillations on Neutrino-driven Winds and Their Nucleosynthesis

TL;DR

Fast flavor oscillations near the PNS surface can significantly alter neutrino-driven wind conditions, increasing mass loss and proton-richness, thereby affecting nucleosynthesis of certain isotopes and broader chemical evolution.

Contribution

This study demonstrates the potential impact of fast flavor oscillations on neutrino-driven winds and nucleosynthesis, using supernova simulation data to quantify effects.

Findings

Mass loss increased by up to 1.7 times due to oscillations.

Wind becomes more proton-rich, enhancing certain isotope production.

Implications for stellar abundances and chemical evolution are discussed.

Abstract

The wind driven by the intense neutrino emission from a protoneutron star (PNS) is an important site for producing nuclei heavier than the Fe group. Because of certain features in the neutrino angular distributions, the so-called fast flavor oscillations may occur very close to the PNS surface, effectively resetting the neutrino luminosities and energy spectra that drive the wind. Using the unoscillated neutrino emission characteristics from two core-collapse supernova simulations representative of relevant progenitors at the lower and higher mass end, we study the potential effects of fast flavor oscillations on neutrino-driven winds and their nucleosynthesis. We find that such oscillations can increase the total mass loss by factors up to ~ 1.5-1.7 and lead to significantly more proton-rich conditions. The latter effect can greatly enhance the production of 64Zn and the so-called light p-nuclei 74Se, 78Kr, and 84Sr. Implications for abundances in metal-poor stars, Galactic chemical evolution in general, and isotopic anomalies in meteorites are discussed.