Radiative decay of a massive particle and the nonthermal process in primordial nucleosynthesis

Masahiro Kawasaki, Kazunori Kohri, and Takeo Moroi
Phys. Rev. D 63, 103502 – Published 9 April 2001
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Abstract

We consider the effects on big bang nucleosynthesis (BBN) of the radiative decay of a long-lived massive particle. If high-energy photons are emitted after the BBN epoch (t1103sec), they may change the abundance of the light elements through photodissociation processes, which may result in a significant discrepancy between standard BBN and observation. Taking into account recent observational and theoretical developments in this field, we revise our previous study constraining the abundance of the radiatively decaying particles. In particular, on the theoretical side it was recently claimed that the nonthermal production of 6Li, which is caused by the photodissociation of 4He, most severely constrains the abundance of the radiatively decaying particle. We will see however, that it is premature to emphasize the importance of the nonthermal production of 6Li because (i) the theoretical computation of the 6Li abundance has a large uncertainty due to the lack of a precise understanding of the 6Li production cross section, and (ii) the observational data of the 6Li abundance has large errors.

  • Received 22 December 2000

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevD.63.103502

©2001 American Physical Society

Authors & Affiliations

Masahiro Kawasaki

  • Research Center for the Early Universe, School of Science, University of Tokyo, Tokyo 113-0033, Japan

Kazunori Kohri

  • Yukawa Institute for Theoretical Physics, Kyoto University, Kyoto 606-8502, Japan

Takeo Moroi

  • Department of Physics, Tohoku University, Sendai 980-8578, Japan

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Issue

Vol. 63, Iss. 10 — 15 May 2001

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