An effective field theory for non-relativistic Majorana neutrinos

Abstract

Heavy Majorana neutrinos enter in many scenarios of physics beyond the Standard Model: in the original seesaw mechanism they provide a natural explanation for the small masses of the Standard Model neutrinos and in the simplest leptogenesis framework they are at the origin of the baryonic matter of the universe. In this paper, we develop an effective field theory for non-relativistic Majorana particles, which is analogous to the heavy-quark effective theory. Then, we apply it to the case of a heavy Majorana neutrino decaying in a hot and dense plasma of Standard Model particles, whose temperature is much smaller than the mass of the Majorana neutrino but still much larger than the electroweak scale. The thermal corrections to the width computed in the effective field theory agree with recent results obtained using different methods, whereas the derivation appears to be simpler. The effective field theory presented here is suitable to be used for a variety of different models involving non-relativistic Majorana fermions.