Planck scale origin of nonzero θ13 and super-WIMP dark matter

Abstract

We study a discrete flavor symmetric scenario for neutrino mass and dark matter under the circumstances where such global discrete symmetries can be explicitly broken at the Planck scale, possibly by gravitational effects. Such explicit breaking of discrete symmetries mimic as Planck suppressed operators in the model, which can have nontrivial consequences for neutrino and dark matter sectors. In particular, we study a flavor symmetric model which, at a renormalizable level, gives rise to tri-bimaximal type neutrino mixing with vanishing reactor mixing angle θ13=0, a stable inert scalar doublet behaving like a weakly interacting massive particle (WIMP) and a stable singlet inert fermion that does not interact with any other particles. The introduction of Planck suppressed operators that explicitly break the discrete symmetries can give rise to the generation of nonzero θ13 in agreement with neutrino data and also open up decay channels of inert scalar doublet into singlet neutral inert fermions leading to the realization of the super-WIMP dark matter scenario. We show that the correct neutrino phenomenology can be obtained in this model while discussing three distinct realizations of the super-WIMP dark matter scenario.