Current cosmological data drop an interesting hint about the existence of sub-eV sterile neutrinos, which should be a part of the cosmic neutrino background (C$ν$B). We point out that such light sterile neutrinos may leave a distinct imprint on the electron energy spectrum in the capture of relic electron neutrinos by means of radioactive beta-decaying nuclei. We examine possible signals of sterile neutrinos relative to active neutrinos, characterized by their masses and sensitive to their number densities, in the reaction $ν^{}_e + ~^3{\rm H} \to ~^3{\rm He} + e^-$ against the corresponding tritium beta decay. We stress that this kind of direct laboratory detection of the C$ν$B and its sterile component might not be hopeless in the long term.
Using an analytic treatment, we discuss the parameter regions of large active-sterile neutrino mixing angles where sterile neutrinos produced in non-resonant flavour oscillations can approach thermalization in several cosmologies. We show that thermalization affects only large active-sterile neutrino mixing already rejected by different limits. Hence, the allowed sterile neutrino parameter regions are unaffected.
Numerous anomalous results in neutrino oscillation experiments can be attributed to interference of ~1 eV sterile neutrino. The specially designed to fully explore the Gallium anomaly Baksan Experiment on Sterile Transitions (BEST) starts next year. We investigate the sensitivity of BEST in searches for sterile neutrino mixed with electron neutrino. Then, performing the combined analysis of all the Gallium experiments (SAGE, GALLEX, BEST) we find the regions in model parameter space (sterile neutrino mass and mixing angle), which will be excluded if BEST agrees with no sterile neutrino hypothe…
We review sterile neutrinos as possible Dark Matter candidates. After a short summary on the role of neutrinos in cosmology and particle physics, we give a comprehensive overview of the current status of the research on sterile neutrino Dark Matter. First we discuss the motivation and limits obtained through astrophysical observations. Second, we review different mechanisms of how sterile neutrino Dark Matter could have been produced in the early universe. Finally, we outline a selection of future laboratory searches for keV-scale sterile neutrinos, highlighting their experimental challenges a…
Neutrinos, being the only fermions in the Standard Model of Particle Physics that do not possess electromagnetic or color charges, have the unique opportunity to communicate with fermions outside the Standard Model through mass mixing. Such Standard Model-singlet fermions are generally referred to as "sterile neutrinos''. In this review article, we discuss the theoretical and experimental motivation for sterile neutrinos, as well as their phenomenological consequences. With the benefit of hindsight in 2020, we point out potentially viable and interesting ideas. We focus in particular on steril…
New predictions for the anti-neutrino flux emitted by nuclear reactors suggest that reactor experiments may have measured a deficit in the anti-neutrino flux, which can be interpreted in terms of oscillations between the known active neutrinos and new sterile states. Motivated by this observation, we perform a re-analysis of global short-baseline neutrino oscillation data in a framework with one or two sterile neutrinos. While one sterile neutrino is still not sufficient to reconcile the signals suggested by reactor experiments and by the LSND and MiniBooNE experiments with null results from o…
We perform a comparative analysis of constraints on sterile neutrinos from the Planck experiment and from current and future neutrino oscillation experiments (MINOS, IceCube, SBN). For the first time, we express the Planck constraints on $N_{\rm eff}$ and $m_{\rm eff}^{\rm sterile}$ from the Cosmic Microwave Background in the parameter space used by oscillation experiments using both mass-squared differences and mixing angles. In a model with a single sterile neutrino species and using standard assumptions, we find that the Planck data and the oscillation experiments measuring muon-neutrino di…
We study a model of a keV-scale sterile neutrino with a relatively large mixing with the Standard Model sector. Usual considerations predict active generation of such particles in the early Universe, which leads to constraints from the total Dark Matter density and absence of X-ray signal from sterile neutrino decay. These bounds together may deem any attempt of creation of the keV scale sterile neutrino in the laboratory unfeasible. We argue that for models with a hidden sector coupled to the sterile neutrino these bounds can be evaded, opening new perspectives for the direct studies at neutr…
The indications in favor of the existence of light sterile neutrinos at the eV scale found in short-baseline neutrino oscillation experiments is reviewed. The future perspectives of short-baseline neutrino oscillation experiments and the connections with beta-decay measurements of the neutrino masses and with neutrinoless double-beta decay experiments are discussed.
It is generally expected that adding light sterile species would increase the effective number of neutrinos, $N_{eff}$. In this paper we discuss a scenario that $N_{eff}$ can actually decrease due to the neutrino oscillation effect if sterile neutrinos have self-interactions. We specifically focus on the eV mass range, as suggested by the neutrino anomalies. With large self-interactions, sterile neutrinos are not fully thermalized in the early Universe because of the suppressed effective mixing angle or matter effect. As the Universe cools down, flavor equilibrium between active and sterile sp…
We explore the possibility of light and superlight sterile neutrinos in the recently proposed Minimal Radiative Inverse Seesaw extension of the Standard Model for neutrino masses, in which all existing neutrino data can be explained. In particular, we discuss two benchmark scenarios with one of the three sterile neutrino states in the keV-range, having very small mixing with the active neutrinos to account for the Dark Matter in the Universe, while (i) the other two light sterile neutrino states could be in the eV-range, possessing a nonzero mixing with the active states as required to explain…
Recently the Baksan Experiment on Sterile Transitions (BEST) has presented results confirming the gallium anomaly -- a lack of electron neutrinos $ν_e$ at calibrations of SAGE and GALLEX -- at the statistical significance exceeding 5$\,σ$. This result is consistent with explanation of the gallium anomaly as electron neutrino oscillations into sterile neutrino, $ν_s$. Within this explanation the BEST experiment itself provides the strongest evidence for the sterile neutrino among all the previous anomalous results in the neutrino sector. We combine the results of gallium experiments with search…
After a brief review of the results of solar, atmospheric and long-baseline neutrino oscillation experiments which led to the current three-neutrino mixing paradigm, we discuss indications of neutrino oscillation experiments in favor of short-baseline oscillations which require the existence of one or more sterile neutrinos. We show that the simplest possibility of existence of one sterile neutrino is not enough to fit all data of short-baseline neutrino oscillation experiments because of two tensions: a tension between neutrino and antineutrino data and a tension between appearance and disapp…
Neutrino-neutrino interactions, as mediated by standard model Z exchange, can drastically enhance the Dodelson-Widrow mechanism for the production of sterile neutrinos in the region of temperature $5-15$MeV. For a sterile mass in the KeV region with the usual type of active-sterile neutrino coupling, the production can be copious enough to provide ample dark matter, even when the active-sterile coupling is small enough to avoid the bounds set by laboratory results.
Unexplored interactions of neutrinos could be the key to understanding the nature of the dark matter (DM). In particular, active neutrinos with new self-interactions can produce keV-mass sterile neutrinos that account for the whole of the DM through the Dodelson-Widrow mechanism for a large range of active-sterile mixing values. This production typically occurs before Big-Bang Nucleosynthesis (BBN) in a yet uncharted era of the Universe. We assess how the mixing range for keV-mass sterile neutrino DM is affected by the uncertainty in the early Universe pre-BBN cosmology. This is particularly r…
Sterile neutrinos in the electronvolt mass range are hinted at by a number of terrestrial neutrino experiments. However, such neutrinos are highly incompatible with data from the Cosmic Microwave Background and large scale structure. This paper discusses how charging sterile neutrinos under a new pseudoscalar interaction can reconcile eV sterile neutrinos with terrestrial neutrino data. We show that this model can reconcile eV sterile neutrinos in cosmology, providing a fit to all available data which is way better than the standard $Λ$CDM model with one additional fully thermalized sterile ne…
Considering the gauge model SU(2)_L x U(1) with the extension of the lepton sector by right-handed sterile Majorana neutrinos, we distinguish a "minimal parametric mixing scenario" for a complete matrix of 6 x 6 light (active) and sterile neutrinos, which depends, in addition to experimentally measured physical parameters, only on the masses of sterile neutrinos. For such a scenario, improved cosmological bounds are provided, resulting from the lifetime of sterile neutrinos and the fraction of energy carried by sterile neutrino dark matter.
We study a scenario where sterile neutrino (either warm or cold) dark matter (DM) is produced through (nonresonant) oscillations among right-handed neutrinos (RHNs) and can constitute the whole DM in the Universe, in contrast to the conventional sterile neutrino production through its mixing with the left-handed neutrinos. The lightest RHN can be sterile neutrino DM whose mixing with left-handed neutrinos is sufficiently small while heavier RHNs can have non-negligible mixings with left-handed neutrinos to explain the neutrino masses by the seesaw mechanism. We also demonstrate that, in our sc…
Sterile neutrinos can be produced in the early universe via interactions with their active counterparts. For small active-sterile mixing angles, thermal equilibrium with the standard model plasma is not reached and sterile neutrinos are only produced via flavor oscillations. We study in detail this regime, taking into account matter potentials and decoherence effects caused by elastic scatterings with the plasma. We find that resonant oscillations occurring at temperatures $T\lesssim 10\,\mathrm{GeV}$ lead to a significant enhancement of the sterile neutrino production rate. Taking this into a…
We derive bounds on the mixing between the left-chiral ("active") and the right-chiral ("sterile") neutrinos, provided from the combination of neutrino oscillation data and direct experimental searches for sterile neutrinos. We demonstrate that the mixing of sterile neutrinos with any flavour can be significantly suppressed, provided that the angle theta_13 is non-zero. This means that the lower bounds on sterile neutrino lifetime, coming from the negative results of direct experimental searches can be relaxed (by as much as the order of magnitude at some masses). We also demonstrate that the …
We study the effects of kination and scalar-tensor pre-Big Bang Nucleosynthesis cosmologies on the non-resonant production of sterile neutrinos. We show that if the peak of the production rate of sterile neutrinos occurs during the non-standard cosmological phase, the relic number density of sterile neutrinos could be reduced with respect to the number expected in the standard cosmology. Consequently, current bounds on active-sterile neutrino mixing derived from the relic energy density of sterile neutrinos could be greatly relaxed. In particular, we show that the sterile neutrinos which could…
Sterile massive neutrinos are a natural extension of the Standard Model of elementary particles. The energy density of the extra sterile massive states affects cosmological measurements in an analogous way to that of active neutrino species. We perform here an analysis of current cosmological data and derive bounds on the masses of the active and the sterile neutrino states as well as on the number of sterile states. The so-called (3+2) models with three sub-eV active massive neutrinos plus two sub-eV massive sterile species is well within the 95% CL allowed regions when considering cosmologic…
We consider the possibility of the lightest sterile neutrino dark matter which has dipole interaction with heavier sterile neutrinos. The lifetime can be long enough to be a dark matter candidate without violating other constraints and the correct amount of relic abundance can be produced in the early Universe. We find that a sterile neutrino with the mass of around MeV and the dimension-five non-renormalisable dipole interaction suppressed by $Λ_5 \gtrsim 10^{15}$ GeV can be a good candidate of dark matter, while heavier sterile neutrinos with masses of the order of GeV can explain the active…
The Short BaseLine (SBL) neutrino oscillation anomalies hint at the presence of a sterile neutrino with a mass of around 1 eV. However, such a neutrino is incompatible with cosmological data, in particular observations of the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) anisotropies. However, this conclusion can change by invoking new physics. One possibility is to introduce a secret interaction in the sterile neutrino sector mediated by a light pseudoscalar. In this pseudoscalar model, CMB data prefer a sterile neutrino mass that is fully compatible with the mass ranges suggested by SBL anomalies. In ad…
We briefly discuss the main effects of the presence of a Light Sterile Neutrino (LS$ν$) in Cosmology and how its properties can be constrained by Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) and other cosmological measurements.
Short baseline neutrino oscillation experiments have shown hints of the existence of additional sterile neutrinos in the eV mass range. However, such neutrinos seem incompatible with cosmology because they have too large an impact on cosmic structure formation. Here we show that new interactions in the sterile neutrino sector can prevent their production in the early Universe and reconcile short baseline oscillation experiments with cosmology.
The Short BaseLine (SBL) neutrino oscillations anomalies hint at the presence of a sterile neutrino with a mass of around 1 eV. However, such neutrino is highly incompatible with the cosmological data, in particular from the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB), if no new physics is assumed. An interesting possibility for reconciling the 1 eV sterile neutrino presence in cosmology is related to the existence of a new pseudoscalar interaction. If the sterile neutrinos experience such a pseudoscalar interaction, the cosmological analyses of the full CMB data prefer a sterile neutrino mass that is f…
Sterile neutrinos can be a possible candidate for dark matter. Sterile neutrinos are radiatively unstable and can inject photon energy into the intergalactic medium (IGM). The injection of photon energy into IGM can modify the temperature and ionization history of IGM gas during cosmic dawn. Theoretical models based on the ΛCDM framework predict an absorption profile in the 21 cm line during the cosmic dawn era. Recently, the Experiment to Detect the Global Epoch of Reionization Signature (EDGES) collaboration confirmed such an adsorption signal. Injection of energy into IGM can modify the abs…
We examine the possibility that direct dark matter detection experiments find decay products from sterile neutrino dark mater in $U(1)_{B-L}$ and $U(1)_R$ models. This is possible if the sterile neutrino interacts with a light gauge boson and decays into a neutrino and the light gauge boson with a certain lifetime. This decay produces energetic neutrinos scattering off nuclei with a large enough recoil energy in direct dark matter detection experiments. We stress that direct dark matter detection experiments can explore not only WIMP but also sterile neutrino dark matter.
Sterile neutrino dark matter, a popular alternative to the WIMP paradigm, has generally been studied in non-supersymmetric setups. If the underlying theory is supersymmetric, we find that several interesting and novel dark matter features can arise. In particular, in scenarios of freeze-in production of sterile neutrino dark matter, its superpartner, the sterile sneutrino, can play a crucial role in early Universe cosmology as the dominant source of cold, warm, or hot dark matter, or of a subdominant relativistic population of sterile neutrinos that can contribute to the effective number of re…
Both particle physics experiments and cosmological surveys can constrain the properties of sterile neutrinos, but do so with different parameterizations that naturally use different prior information. We present joint constraints on the 3$+$1 sterile neutrino model oscillation parameters, $Δm_{41}^2$ and $\sin^22θ$, with log priors on those parameters using mostly cosmological data from the Planck satellite. Two cases are considered, one where the sterile neutrino mixes with electron neutrinos solely, and another where the sterile neutrino mixes exclusively with muon neutrinos, allowing us to …
We study the phenomenology of a light (GeV scale) sterile neutrino sector and the pseudo-Goldstone boson (not the majoron) associated with a global symmetry in this sector that is broken at a high scale. Such scenarios can be motivated from considerations of singlet fermions from a hidden sector coupling to active neutrinos via heavy right-handed seesaw neutrinos, effectively giving rise to a secondary, low-energy seesaw framework. Such scenarios allow for rich phenomenology with observable implications for cosmology, dark matter, and direct searches, involving novel sterile neutrino dark matt…
Short baseline neutrino oscillation experiments have shown hints of the existence of additional sterile neutrinos in the eV mass range. Such sterile neutrinos are incompatible with cosmology because they suppress structure formation unless they can be prevented from thermalising in the early Universe or removed by subsequent decay or annihilation. Here we present a novel scenario in which both sterile neutrinos and dark matter are coupled to a new, light pseudoscalar. This can prevent thermalisation of sterile neutrinos and make dark matter sufficiently self-interacting to have an impact on ga…
We use the Chandra unresolved X-ray emission spectrum from a 12'-28' (2.8-6.4 kpc) annular region of the Andromeda galaxy to constrain the radiative decay of sterile neutrino warm dark matter. By excising the most baryon-dominated, central 2.8 kpc of the galaxy, we reduce the uncertainties in our estimate of the dark matter mass within the field of view and improve the signal-to-noise ratio of prospective sterile neutrino decay signatures relative to hot gas and unresolved stellar emission. Our findings impose the most stringent limit on the sterile neutrino mass to date in the context of the …
Secret interactions among sterile neutrinos have been recently proposed as an escape-route to reconcile eV sterile neutrino hints from short-baseline anomalies with cosmological observations. In particular models with coupling g_X \gtrsim 10^{-2} and gauge boson mediators $X$ with $M_X \lesssim 10$ MeV lead to large matter potential suppressing the sterile neutrino production before the neutrino decoupling. With this choice of parameter ranges, big bang nucleosynthesis is left unchanged and gives no bound on the model. However, we show that at lower temperatures when active-sterile oscillation…
Sterile neutrinos are natural extensions to the standard model of particle physics in neutrino mass generation mechanisms. If they are relatively light, less than approximately 10 keV, they can alter cosmology significantly, from the early Universe to the matter and radiation energy density today. Here, we review the cosmological role such light sterile neutrinos can play from the early Universe, including production of keV-scale sterile neutrinos as dark matter candidates, and dynamics of light eV-scale sterile neutrinos during the weakly-coupled active neutrino era. We review proposed signat…
We obtain non-linear kinetic equations for sterile neutrino occupancies and lepton minus baryon numbers by matching real time correlation functions of thermal fluctuations computed in an effective description to those computed in thermal quantum field theory. After expanding in the sterile-neutrino Yukawa couplings, the coefficients in the equations are written as real time correlation functions of Standard Model operators. Our kinetic equations are valid for an arbitrary number of sterile neutrinos of any mass spectrum. They can be used to describe, e.g., low-scale leptogenesis via neutrino o…
Big Bang Nucleosynthesis imposes stringent bounds on light sterile neutrinos mixing with the active flavors. Here we discuss how altered dispersion relations can weaken such bounds and allow compatibility of new sterile neutrino degrees of freedom with a successful generation of the light elements in the early Universe.
Sterile neutrino dark matter is expected to suppress structure formation at small astrophysical scales. The details of the suppression depend on the sterile neutrino production mechanism in the early universe. In this proceeding, we focus on the most popular cases of resonant production (via the mixing between active and sterile neutrinos) and scalar decay production (via the decay of a hypothetical scalar singlet). We first review current constraints from structure formation before discussing how the sterile neutrino dark matter hypothesis can alleviate the overabundance problem of dwarf gala…
We generalize gravitational particle production in a radiation-dominated $CPT$-symmetric universe to non-standard, but also $CPT$-symmetric early universe cosmologies. We calculate the mass of a right-handed "sterile" neutrino needed for it to be the cosmological dark matter. Since generically sterile neutrinos mix with the Standard Model active neutrinos, we use state-of-the-art tools to compute the expected spectrum of gamma rays and high-energy active neutrinos from ultra-heavy sterile neutrino dark matter decay. We demonstrate that the sterile neutrinos are never in thermal equilibrium in …
