Probing left-right seesaw models using beam polarization at an e+e− collider

Abstract

We show that the longitudinal beam polarization option at a future electron-positron collider provides an unambiguous distinction between low-scale seesaw models of neutrino mass. This is possible due to the fact that the pair production cross section of the heavy neutrinos in seesaw models is sensitive to the polarization of the initial lepton beams, and for a suitable choice of the polarization, shows a clear enhancement over the unpolarized cross section. More interestingly, the choice of the beam polarization for which the enhancement is maximum is governed by the size of the light-heavy neutrino mixing parameter. We also find that using this effect, one can probe a previously uncharted parameter space of the left-right seesaw model, which is complementary to the existing searches at both energy and intensity frontiers.