TeV-scale unification of light dark matter and neutrino mass

TL;DR

This paper proposes a TeV-scale model linking neutrino mass generation with dark matter properties, predicting observable signals at future neutrino detectors.

Contribution

It introduces a unified framework where TeV-scale heavy neutral leptons generate neutrino masses and dark matter, connecting cosmology with collider and neutrino experiments.

Findings

TeV-scale heavy neutral leptons can produce the correct dark matter relic abundance.

The model predicts sub-GeV dark matter with specific decay properties.

Observable neutrino signals are expected at JUNO, Hyper-Kamiokande, and DUNE.

Abstract

We demonstrate that TeV-scale heavy neutral leptons (HNLs) responsible for inverse-seesaw neutrino mass generation can simultaneously fix the cosmological abundance and decay properties of dark matter (DM). The spontaneous breaking of lepton number gives rise to a pseudo-Nambu-Goldstone boson that serves as a light DM candidate, whose mass originates from a small explicit symmetry-breaking term. The same HNLs that generate neutrino masses produce the DM via freeze-in and mediate its decay into neutrinos, leading to a tight correlation among neutrino masses, DM relic abundance, and DM lifetime. For collider-accessible TeV-scale HNLs, the observed relic density and lifetime constraints point to sub-GeV DM, yielding observable neutrino signals at JUNO and next-generation detectors such as Hyper-Kamiokande and DUNE. This framework establishes a predictive and experimentally testable link between neutrino mass generation and DM.