Neutrino As The Dark Force

TL;DR

This paper proposes that Standard Model neutrinos can mediate long-range interactions between dark matter particles, potentially affecting cosmic structure formation and offering new avenues for experimental testing.

Contribution

It introduces a novel neutrino portal mechanism where neutrinos generate dark matter self-interactions without additional dark force carriers.

Findings

Neutrino-mediated dark matter interactions can influence small-scale structure formation.

The proposed mechanism is testable via decay measurements at future particle colliders.

The model links neutrino physics with dark matter phenomenology in a new way.

Abstract

We point out a novel role for the Standard Model neutrino in dark matter phenomenology where the exchange of neutrinos generates a long-range potential between dark matter particles. The resulting dark matter self interaction could be sufficiently strong to impact small-scale structure formation, without the need of any dark force carrier. This is a generic feature of theories where dark matter couples to the visible sector through the neutrino portal. It is highly testable with improved decay rate measurements at future $Z$, Higgs, and $\tau$ factories, as well as precision cosmology.