Majorana neutrinos and dark matter from anomaly cancellation

Abstract

We discuss a simple theory for neutrino masses where the total lepton number is a local gauge symmetry spontaneously broken below the multi-TeV scale. In this context, the neutrino masses are generated through the canonical seesaw mechanism and a Majorana dark matter candidate is predicted from anomaly cancellation. We discuss in great detail the dark matter annihilation channels and find out the upper bound on the symmetry-breaking scale using the cosmological bounds on the relic density. Since in this context the dark matter candidate has suppressed couplings to the Standard Model quarks, one can satisfy the direct detection bounds even if the dark matter mass is close to the electroweak scale. This theory predicts a light pseudo-Nambu-Goldstone boson (the Majoron) associated to the mechanism of neutrino mass. We discuss briefly the properties of the Majoron and the impact of the big bang nucleosynthesis bounds. Published by the American Physical Society 2024