Phenomenological implications of sterile neutrinos in the $\mu\nu$SSM and dark matter

TL;DR

This paper explores how sterile neutrinos within the $mbda$SSM framework can serve as dark matter candidates, analyzing their properties, decay channels, and compatibility with cosmological and collider constraints.

Contribution

It demonstrates that a keV-MeV sterile neutrino in the $mbda$SSM can be a viable dark matter candidate, consistent with neutrino data and astrophysical observations.

Findings

Sterile neutrino with ~10 keV mass can be dark matter with lifetime exceeding the universe.

Three-body decay dominates the sterile neutrino lifetime, with observable X-ray signatures from one-loop decay.

Parameter space exists in the $mbda$SSM satisfying neutrino, dark matter, and collider constraints.

Abstract

We analyze the role of sterile neutrinos in the framework of the $\mu\nu$SSM, where the presence of right-handed neutrinos provides a simultaneous solution to $\mu$- and $\nu$-problems in supersymmetry. We adopt a minimalistic approach, reproducing light neutrino masses and mixing angles at tree level using just two right-handed neutrinos as part of the seesaw mechanism. A third right-handed neutrino does not contribute significantly to the mass of the three active ones, behaving as a sterile neutrino with a mass in the range keV$-$MeV. Furthermore, a sterile neutrino of about $10$ keV can be a good candidate for dark matter with a lifetime larger than the age of the Universe. In particular, the three-body decay to active neutrinos gives the dominant contribution to its lifetime. The one-loop decay to gamma and active neutrino is subdominant, but relevant for observations such as astrophysical X-rays. We find regions of the parameter space of the $\mu\nu$SSM, with different values of the sterile neutrino mass, fulfilling not only these constraints but also collider constraints from the Higgs sector.