Common origin of neutrino mass and dark matter from anomaly cancellation requirements of a U(1)B−L model

Abstract

We study a gauged $B\ensuremath{-}L$ extension of the standard model where the new fermions with fractional $B\ensuremath{-}L$ charges that play the role of keeping the model anomaly free can also explain the origin of the neutrino mass at one loop level as well as dark matter. We discuss two different versions of the model to realize fermion and scalar dark matter, both of which guarantee the dark matter stability by a remnant discrete symmetry to which $U(1{)}_{B\ensuremath{-}L}$ gauge symmetry gets spontaneously broken down to. Apart from giving rise to the observed neutrino mass and dark matter abundance, the model also has tantalizing signatures at a variety of experiments operating at cosmic, intensity, and energy frontiers, particularly direct and indirect detection experiments of dark matter, rare decay experiments looking for charged lepton flavor violation as well as collider experiments. The model also predicts vanishing lightest neutrino mass that can be tested at experiments sensitive to the absolute neutrino mass scale.