Electron-positron annihilation freeze-out in the early universe
Open accessAbstract
Electron-positron annihilation largely occurs in local thermal and chemical equilibrium after the neutrinos fall out of thermal equilibrium and during the big bang nucleosynthesis (BBN) epoch. The effects of this process are evident in BBN yields as well as the relativistic degrees of freedom. We self-consistently calculate the collision integral for electron-positron creation and annihilation using the Klein-Nishina amplitude and appropriate statistical factors for Fermi blocking and Bose enhancement. Our calculations suggest that this annihilation freezes out when the photon-electron-positron-baryon plasma temperature is approximately 16 keV, after which its rate drops below the Hubble rate. In the temperature regime near 16 keV, we break the assumption of chemical equilibrium between the electrons, positrons, and photons to independently calculate the evolution of the chemical potentials of the electrons and positrons while computing the associated collision integrals at every time step. We find that the electron and positron chemical potentials deviate from the case with chemical equilibrium. While our results do not affect the interpretation of precision cosmological measurements in elucidating the standard cosmological model, these out of equilibrium effects may be important for testing physics beyond the standard model.
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Quantum plasmas can be found in diverse contexts including dense astrophysical objects, warm dense matter, laboratory plasmas, and plasmas in the early universe.
“quantum plasmas can be found in rather diverse contexts, including dense astrophysical objects (Chabrier et al. 2002; Uzdensky and Rightley 2014) (white dwarf stars, neutron stars), warm dense matter, laboratory plasmas (Glenzer and Redmer 2009), and plasmas in the early universe (Thomas et al. 2020).”
From Quantum kinetic theory of plasmas (2022) · cites this paper as Thomas et al. 2020
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Cited by
Sorted by citations
Quantum kinetic theory of plasmas
Brodin, G., & Zamanian, J. (2022) · Reviews of Modern Plasma Physics · doi:10.1007/s41614-022-00065-5 · Cited by 37 · see citing works
- Authors
- Thomas, L. C., Dezen, T., Grohs, E. B., & Kishimoto, C. T.
- Affiliations
- University of San Diego (US)
- University of California, Berkeley (US)
- Venue
- Physical Review D
- Publisher
- American Physical Society (APS)
- Published
- 2020-03-05
- Volume
- 101
- Issue
- 6
- ISSN
- 2470-0010 (ISSN-L)
- 2470-0029
- OpenAlex
- W2947458597
- Cited by
- 24
- References
- 28
- Citations by year
- 2026: 3 · 2025: 4 · 2024: 5 · 2023: 3 · 2022: 6 · 2021: 1 · 2020: 1 · 2017: 1
- FWCI
- 1.23
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- hybrid
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- Physical review. D/Physical review. D. (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- arXiv (Cornell University) (submittedVersion)
- arXiv (Cornell University)
- Funders
- National Science Foundation (PHY-1812383, PHY-1630782)
- Heising-Simons Foundation (2017-228)
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Physics and Astronomy › Astronomy and Astrophysics › Cosmology and Gravitation Theories
- Physical Sciences › Physics and Astronomy › Nuclear and High Energy Physics › Particle physics theoretical and experimental studies
- Physical Sciences › Physics and Astronomy › Nuclear and High Energy Physics › Dark Matter and Cosmic Phenomena
- Keywords
- electron-positron annihilation, freeze-out, early universe, big bang nucleosynthesis, collision integral, Bose enhancement, chemical equilibrium, relativistic degrees of freedom, Hubble expansion rate, beyond the Standard Model
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