Fast neutrino flavor conversion as oscillations in a quartic potential

2017/09/30 by Basudeb Dasgupta, Manibrata Sen · 5 citations
Physics and Astronomy · #Astrophysics and Cosmic Phenomena #Neutrino #Neutrino Physics Research #Neutrino oscillation #Omega #Order (exchange) #Oscillation (cell signaling) #Particle physics #Particle physics theoretical and experimental studies #Physics #Quantum mechanics #Quartic function #Scattering #Supernova #astro-ph.HE #hep-ph

paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physrevd.97.023017

published as Phys. Rev. D 97, 023017 (2018) · v3: 9 pages, 14 figures. Matches version published in PRD

openalex publication_date 2018/01/25 · arxiv created 2018/02/01 · arxiv updated 2018/02/02 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05

Abstract

Neutrinos in dense environments undergo collective pair conversions \ensuremathν_e\ensuremathν_e\ensuremath↔\ensuremathν_x\ensuremathν_x, where x is a nonelectron flavor, due to forward scattering off each other that may be a crucial ingredient for supernova explosions. Depending on the flavor-dependent local angular distributions of the neutrino fluxes, the conversion rate can be ``fast,'' i.e., of the order \ensuremathμ=√(2)G_Fn_\ensuremathν, which can far exceed the usual neutrino oscillation frequency \ensuremathω=\mathrm\ensuremathΔm²/(2E). Until now, this surprising nonlinear phenomenon has only been understood in the linear regime and explored further using numerical experiments. We present an analytical treatment of the simplest system that exhibits fast conversions, and show that the conversion can be understood as the dynamics of a particle rolling down in a quartic potential, governed dominantly by \ensuremathμ but seeded by slower subleading effects.

Citations

• Simulation of coherent nonlinear neutrino flavor transformation in the supernova environment: Correlated neutrino trajectories
• Self-induced conversion in dense neutrino gases: Pendulum in flavor space
• Speed-up of neutrino transformations in a supernova environment
• Collective Neutrino Oscillations
• Supernova neutrinos: fast flavor conversions near the core

Cited by

• Time of flight and supernova progenitor effects on the neutrino halo
• Simple method of diagnosing fast flavor conversions of supernova neutrinos
• Entanglement and collective flavor oscillations in a dense neutrino gas
• Mu-Tau Neutrinos: Influencing Fast Flavor Conversions in Supernovae
• Fast neutrino flavor conversions in one-dimensional core-collapse supernova models with and without muon creation