Hot Leptogenesis

Abstract

We investigate a class of leptogenesis scenarios in which the sector containing the lightest right-handed neutrino establishes kinetic equilibrium at a temperature $T_{N_1} > T_\text{SM}$, where $T_\text{SM}$ is the temperature of the Standard Model sector. We study the reheating processes which realise this "hot leptogenesis" and the conditions under which kinetic and chemical equilibrium can be maintained. We derive and solve two sets of evolution equations, depending on the presence of chemical equilibrium within the hot sector, and numerically solve these for benchmark scenarios. We compare the viable parameter space of this model with standard leptogenesis scenarios with a thermal initial condition and find that hot leptogenesis resolves the neutrino and Higgs mass fine-tuning problems present in the standard scenario.