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T: Fachverband Teilchenphysik

T 20: Neutrinophysik (Theorie) 1

T 20.2: Talk

Thursday, March 12, 2009, 17:00–17:15, M109

Oscillations of Mössbauer neutrinos — •Joachim Kopp — Max Planck Institut für Kernphsyik, Heidelberg

Recently, Raghavan has proposed an experiment to study neutrinos emitted and absorbed in recoil-free processes. We discuss the theory of these ``Mössbauer neutrinos'', paying special attention to the oscillation phenomenology. In particular, we will show that, in spite of their small energy uncertainty, Mössbauer neutrinos can oscillate. After giving quantum mechanical arguments to support this statement, we will compute the combined rate of emission, propagation and absorption of Mössbauer neutrinos in the framework of quantum field theory. This approach allows us to avoid making any a priori assumptions on the neutrino wave function, and automatically yields the appropriate decoherence and delocalization factors. It will turn out that these factors, which could in principle suppress neutrino oscillations, are irrelevant under realistic experimental conditions.