Low-scale leptogenesis and the domain wall problem in models with discrete flavor symmetries

Abstract

We propose a new mechanism for leptogenesis, which is naturally realized in models with a flavor symmetry based on the discrete group A4, where the symmetry breaking parameter also controls the Majorana masses for the heavy right-handed (RH) neutrinos. During the early universe, for T≳TeV, part of the symmetry is restored, due to finite temperature contributions, and the RH neutrinos remain massless and can be produced in thermal equilibrium even at temperatures well below the most conservative gravitino bounds. Below this temperature the phase transition occurs and they become massive, decaying out of equilibrium and producing the necessary lepton asymmetry. Unless the symmetry is broken explicitly by Planck-suppressed terms, the domain walls generated by the symmetry breaking survive till the quark–hadron phase transition, where they disappear due to a small energy splitting between the A4 vacua caused by the QCD anomaly.