Quantum field theory treatment of oscillations of Dirac neutrinos in external fields

Fuente: arXiv
Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Dvornikov, Maxim
Format: Preprint
Published: 2025
Subjects:
Online Access:
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
_version_ 1866914309950406656
author Dvornikov, Maxim
author_facet Dvornikov, Maxim
contents We study neutrino oscillations in external fields using the approach based on the quantum field theory (QFT). Neutrinos are virtual particles in this formalism. Neutrino mass eigenstates are supposed to be Dirac fermions. We consider two cases of external fields: the neutrino electroweak interaction with background matter and the interaction with an external magnetic field owing to the presence of the transition magnetic moment. The formalism used involves the dressed propagators of mass eigenstates in external fields. In the matter case, finding of these propagators for Dirac neutrinos has certain difficulties compared to the Majorana particles considered previously. These difficulties are overcome by regularizing the effective potential of the neutrino interaction with matter. The QFT formalism application to the spin-flavor precession also encounters certain peculiarities in the Dirac case compared to the Majorana one. They are related to the observability of right polarized Dirac neutrinos. We derive the matrix elements and the probabilities for Dirac neutrinos interacting with both types of external fields. In case of the spin-flavor precession, we obtain the small QFT contribution to the probabilities in addition to the prediction of the quantum mechanical approach.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2510_23760
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Quantum field theory treatment of oscillations of Dirac neutrinos in external fields
Dvornikov, Maxim
High Energy Physics - Phenomenology
High Energy Physics - Theory
We study neutrino oscillations in external fields using the approach based on the quantum field theory (QFT). Neutrinos are virtual particles in this formalism. Neutrino mass eigenstates are supposed to be Dirac fermions. We consider two cases of external fields: the neutrino electroweak interaction with background matter and the interaction with an external magnetic field owing to the presence of the transition magnetic moment. The formalism used involves the dressed propagators of mass eigenstates in external fields. In the matter case, finding of these propagators for Dirac neutrinos has certain difficulties compared to the Majorana particles considered previously. These difficulties are overcome by regularizing the effective potential of the neutrino interaction with matter. The QFT formalism application to the spin-flavor precession also encounters certain peculiarities in the Dirac case compared to the Majorana one. They are related to the observability of right polarized Dirac neutrinos. We derive the matrix elements and the probabilities for Dirac neutrinos interacting with both types of external fields. In case of the spin-flavor precession, we obtain the small QFT contribution to the probabilities in addition to the prediction of the quantum mechanical approach.
title Quantum field theory treatment of oscillations of Dirac neutrinos in external fields
topic High Energy Physics - Phenomenology
High Energy Physics - Theory
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2510.23760