Stellar Collapse Dynamics With Neutrino Flavor Changing Neutral Currents

Abstract

We perform one-zone simulations of the infall epoch of a pre-supernova stellar core in the presence of neutrino flavor changing scattering interactions. Our calculations give a self-consistent assessment of the relationship between flavor changing rates and the reduction in electron fraction and re-distribution of initial electron lepton number among the neutrino flavors. We discuss and include in our calculations sub-nuclear density medium corrections for flavor changing scattering coherence factors. We find that flavor changing couplings epsilon > 3x10^(-4) in either the electron neutrino - muon neutrino or electron neutrino - tau neutrino channels result in a dynamically significant reduction in core electron fraction relatively soon after neutrino trapping and well before the core reaches nuclear matter density.