Leptogenesis and neutrino masses

by Enrico Nardi (LNF)

Thursday 21 Feb 2013, 14:30 → 15:30 Europe/Rome

C (Roma Tre)

Leptogenesis is a class of scenarios in which the cosmic baryon asymmetry originates from an initial lepton asymmetry generated in the decays of heavy sterile neutrinos in the early Universe. I explain why leptogenesis is an appealing mechanism for baryogenesis, and I review its motivations and the basic ingredients. I will then address in some detail the connections between leptogenesis and the scale of the light neutrino masses generated via the seesaw mechanism. I conclude by discussing which future experimental results could provide circumstantial evidences for leptogenesis.