Constraining four neutrino mass patterns from neutrinoless double beta decay

Abstract

All existing data on neutrino oscillations (including those from the LSND experiment) imply a four neutrino scheme with six different allowed mass patterns. Some of the latter are shown to be disfavored by using a conservative upper bound on the $βbeta 0 ν$ nuclear decay rate, if neutrinos are assumed to be Majorana particles. Comparisons are also made with restrictions from tritium $β$-decay and cosmology.