Baryon Asymmetry, Supersymmetry and Gravitational Anomalies

Wash-in leptogenesis is an attractive mechanism to produce the baryon asymmetry of the Universe. It treats right-handed-neutrino interactions as spectator processes, on the same footing as electroweak sphalerons, that reprocess primordial charge asymmetries in the thermal plasma into a baryon-minus-lepton asymmetry. The origin of these primordial charges must be accounted for by new $CP$-violating dynamics at very high energies. In this paper, we propose such a scenario of ch...

In a simple extension of the minimal supersymmetric standard model, out-of-equilibrium decays of TeV scale exotic vector-like squarks may generate the baryon asymmetry of the universe. Baryon number and CP violation are present in the superpotential, so this mechanism does not rely on CP violation in supersymmetry breaking parameters. We discuss phenomenological constraints on the model as well as potential signals for the Large Hadron Collider and electronic dipole moment ex...

A scenario for the generation of the baryon asymmetry in the early Universe is proposed in which cosmic string loops, predicted by theories where the baryon and/or lepton numbers are gauged symmetries, collapse during the friction dominated period of string evolution. This provides a mechanism for the departure from thermal equilibrium necessary to have a nonvanishing baryon asymmetry. Examples of models are given where this idea can be implemented. In particular, the model w...

Electroweak vacuum transition processes (sphalerons) in the early Universe provide a possible explanation of the baryon asymmetry. Anomaly theory suggests that these electroweak baryon number non-conserving processes are accompanied by the formation of a ``topological condensate'' which may remain in the Universe that we observe today.

A generic prediction of models where supersymmetry is broken at scales within a few orders of magnitude of the weak scale and is fed down to the observable sector by gauge interactions is the existence of superconducting cosmic strings which carry baryon number. In this paper we propose a novel mechanism for the generation of the baryon asymmetry which takes place at temperatures much lower than the weak scale. Superconducting strings act like ``bags'' containing the baryon c...

We show that in supersymmetric models with gauged B-L symmetry, there is a new source for cosmological lepton asymmetry. The Higgs bosons responsible for B-L gauge symmetry breaking decay dominantly into right-handed sneutrinos \tilde{N} and \tilde{N}* producing an asymmetry in \tilde{N} over \tilde{N}*. This can be fully converted into ordinary lepton asymmetry in the decays of \tilde{N}. In simple models with gauged B-L symmetry we show that resonant/soft leptogenesis is na...

If the baryon asymmetry of the universe was created at the GUT scale, sphalerons together with exotic sources of $(B-L)$-violation could have erased it, unless the latter satisfy stringent bounds. We elaborate on how the small Yukawa coupling of the electron drastically weakens previous estimates of these bounds.

Although the origin of matter-antimatter asymmetry remains unknown, continuing advances in theory and improved experimental limits have ruled out some scenarios for baryogenesis, for example the sphaleron baryogenesis at the electroweak phase transition in the standard model. At the same time, the success of cosmological inflation and the prospects for discovering supersymmetry at the LHC have put some other models in sharper focus. We review the current state of our understa...

The energy levels of the left and the right handed neutrinos is split in the background of gravitational waves generated during inflation which in presence of lepton number violating interactions gives rise to a net lepton asymmetry at equilibrium. Lepton number violation is achieved by the same dimension five operator which gives rise to neutrino masses after electro-weak symmetry breaking. A net baryon asymmetry of the same magnitude can be generated from this lepton asymme...

We propose a new alternative for baryogenesis which resolves a number of the problems associated with GUT and electroweak scenarios, and which may allow baryogenesis even in modest extensions of the standard model. If the universe never reheats above the electroweak scale following inflation, GUT baryon production does not occur and at the same time thermal sphalerons, gravitinos and monopoles are not produced in abundance. Nevertheless, non-thermal production of sphaleron co...