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Mangano, G., Miele, G., Pastor, S., Pisanti, O., & Sarikas, S. (2011). Constraining the cosmic radiation density due to lepton number with Big Bang Nucleosynthesis. J. Cosmol. Astropart. Phys., 03(3), 035–18pp.
Abstract: The cosmic energy density in the form of radiation before and during Big Bang Nucleosynthesis (BBN) is typically parameterized in terms of the effective number of neutrinos N-eff. This quantity, in case of no extra degrees of freedom, depends upon the chemical potential and the temperature characterizing the three active neutrino distributions, as well as by their possible non-thermal features. In the present analysis we determine the upper bounds that BBN places on N-eff from primordial neutrino-antineutrino asymmetries, with a careful treatment of the dynamics of neutrino oscillations. We consider quite a wide range for the total lepton number in the neutrino sector, eta(nu) = eta(nu e) + eta(nu mu) + eta(nu tau) and the initial electron neutrino asymmetry eta(in)(nu e), solving the corresponding kinetic equations which rule the dynamics of neutrino (antineutrino) distributions in phase space due to collisions, pair processes and flavor oscillations. New bounds on both the total lepton number in the neutrino sector and the nu(e)-(nu) over bar (e) asymmetry at the onset of BBN are obtained fully exploiting the time evolution of neutrino distributions, as well as the most recent determinations of primordial H-2/H density ratio and He-4 mass fraction. Note that taking the baryon fraction as measured by WMAP, the H-2/H abundance plays a relevant role in constraining the allowed regions in the eta(nu)-eta(in)(nu e) plane. These bounds fix the maximum contribution of neutrinos with primordial asymmetries to N-eff as a function of the mixing parameter theta(13), and point out the upper bound N-eff less than or similar to 3.4. Comparing these results with the forthcoming measurement of N-eff by the Planck satellite will likely provide insight on the nature of the radiation content of the universe.
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Diamanti, R., Lopez-Honorez, L., Mena, O., Palomares-Ruiz, S., & Vincent, A. C. (2014). Constraining dark matter late-time energy injection: decays and p-wave annihilations. J. Cosmol. Astropart. Phys., 02(2), 017–24pp.
Abstract: We use the latest cosmic microwave background (CMB) observations to provide updated constraints on the dark matter lifetime as well as on p-wave suppressed annihilation cross sections in the 1 MeV to 1 TeV mass range. In contrast to scenarios with an s-wave dominated annihilation cross section, which mainly affect the CMB close to the last scattering surface, signatures associated with these scenarios essentially appear at low redshifts (z less than or similar to 50) when structure began to form, and thus manifest at lower multipoles in the CMB power spectrum. We use data from Planck, WMAP9, SPT and ACT, as well as Lyman-alpha measurements of the matter temperature at z similar to 4 to set a 95% confidence level lower bound on the dark matter lifetime of similar to 4 x 10(25) s for m(chi) = 100 MeV. This bound becomes lower by an order of magnitude at m(chi) = 1 TeV due to inefficient energy deposition into the inter-galactic medium. We also show that structure formation can enhance the effect of p-wave suppressed annihilation cross sections by many orders of magnitude with respect to the background cosmological rate, although even with this enhancement, CMB constraints are not yet strong enough to reach the thermal relic value of the cross section.
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Olmo, G. J., Orazi, E., & Pradisi, G. (2022). Conformal metric-affine gravities. J. Cosmol. Astropart. Phys., 10(10), 057–21pp.
Abstract: We revisit the gauge symmetry related to integrable projective transformations in metric-affine formalism, identifying the gauge field of the Weyl (conformal) symmetry as a dynamical component of the affine connection. In particular, we show how to include the local scaling symmetry as a gauge symmetry of a large class of geometric gravity theories, introducing a compensator dilaton field that naturally gives rise to a Stuckelberg sector where a spontaneous breaking mechanism of the conformal symmetry is at work to generate a mass scale for the gauge field. For Ricci-based gravities that include, among others, General Relativity, f(R) and f(R, R μnu R μnu) theories and the EiBI model, we prove that the on-shell gauge vector associated to the scaling symmetry can be identified with the torsion vector, thus recovering and generalizing conformal invariant theories in the Riemann-Cartan formalism, already present in the literature.
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Stadler, J., Boehm, C., & Mena, O. (2019). Comprehensive study of neutrino-dark matter mixed damping. J. Cosmol. Astropart. Phys., 08(8), 014–23pp.
Abstract: Mixed damping is a physical effect that occurs when a heavy species is coupled to a relativistic fluid which is itself free streaming. As a cross-case between collisional damping and free-streaming, it is crucial in the context of neutrino-dark matter interactions. In this work, we establish the parameter space relevant for mixed damping, and we derive an analytical approximation for the evolution of dark matter perturbations in the mixed damping regime to illustrate the physical processes responsible for the suppression of cosmological perturbations. Although extended Boltzmann codes implementing neutrino-dark matter scattering terms automatically include mixed damping, this effect has not been systematically studied. In order to obtain reliable numerical results, it is mandatory to reconsider several aspects of neutrino-dark matter interactions, such as the initial conditions, the ultra-relativistic fluid approximation and high order multiple moments in the neutrino distribution. Such a precise treatment ensures the correct assessment of the relevance of mixed damping in neutrino-dark matter interactions.
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Diamanti, R., Ando, S., Gariazzo, S., Mena, O., & Weniger, C. (2017). Cold dark matter plus not-so-clumpy dark relics. J. Cosmol. Astropart. Phys., 06(6), 008–17pp.
Abstract: Various particle physics models suggest that, besides the (nearly) cold dark matter that accounts for current observations, additional but sub-dominant dark relics might exist. These could be warm, hot, or even contribute as dark radiation. We present here a comprehensive study of two-component dark matter scenarios, where the first component is assumed to be cold, and the second is a non-cold thermal relic. Considering the cases where the non-cold dark matter species could be either a fermion or a boson, we derive consistent upper limits on the non-cold dark relic energy density for a very large range of velocity dispersions, covering the entire range from dark radiation to cold dark matter. To this end, we employ the latest Planck Cosmic Microwave Background data, the recent BOSS DR11 and other Baryon Acoustic Oscillation measurements, and also constraints on the number of Milky Way satellites, the latter of which provides a measure of the suppression of the matter power spectrum at the smallest scales due to the free-streaming of the non-cold dark matter component. We present the results on the fraction f(ncdm) of non-cold dark matter with respect to the total dark matter for different ranges of the non-cold dark matter masses. We find that the 2 sigma limits for non-cold dark matter particles with masses in the range 1-10 keV are f(ncdm) <= 0.29 (0.23) for fermions (bosons), and for masses in the 10-100 keV range they are f(ncdm) <= 0.43 (0.45), respectively.
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