Hypothetical particles called heavy neutral leptons (HNLs) can be produced in large quantities in the cores of supernovae during the first seconds of the explosion. These particles then decay, producing secondary energetic neutrinos that can be detected by neutrino detectors. In this paper, I identify a region of the HNL parameter space that could be tested using this method, assuming a supernova explosion at distances from 0.2 to 10 kpc. The range of HNLs masses mN∼160−700 MeV and lifetimes of τN≳0.02 seconds can be probed using the Hyper-Kamiokande neutrino detector. This region of the parameter space is complementary to existing bounds from primordial nucleosynthesis and to the expected sensitivity of the future SHiP experiment, thus covering a gap in our current knowledge of HNLs up to masses of mN≃400 MeV.
@article{arxiv.2301.07052,
title = {Testing heavy neutral leptons produced in the supernovae explosions with future neutrino detectors},
author = {Vsevolod Syvolap},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2301.07052},
year = {2023}
}