Leptogenesis from heavy right-handed neutrinos in CPT violating backgrounds

Eur Phys J C Part Fields. 2018;78(2):113. doi: 10.1140/epjc/s10052-018-5587-5. Epub 2018 Feb 7.

Abstract

We discuss leptogenesis in a model with heavy right-handed Majorana neutrinos propagating in a constant but otherwise generic CPT-violating axial time-like background (motivated by string theory). At temperatures much higher than the temperature of the electroweak phase transition, we solve approximately, but analytically (using Padé approximants), the corresponding Boltzmann equations, which describe the generation of lepton asymmetry from the tree-level decays of heavy neutrinos into Standard Model leptons. At such temperatures these leptons are effectively massless. The current work completes in a rigorous way a preliminary treatment of the same system, by some of the present authors. In this earlier work, lepton asymmetry was crudely estimated considering the decay of a right-handed neutrino at rest. Our present analysis includes thermal momentum modes for the heavy neutrino and this leads to a total lepton asymmetry which is bigger by a factor of two as compared to the previous estimate. Nevertheless, our current and preliminary results for the freezeout are found to be in agreement (within a 12.5 % uncertainty). Our analysis depends on a novel use of Padé approximants to solve the Boltzmann equations and may be more widely useful in cosmology.