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Mass protection via translational invariance

J. L. Alonso, Ph. Boucaud, J. M. Carmona, J. L. Cortes, J. Polonyi, A. J. van der Sijs

hep-tharXiv:hep-th/9807181

Abstract

We propose a way of protecting a Dirac fermion interacting with a scalar field from acquiring a mass from the vacuum. It is obtained through an implementation of translational symmetry when the theory is formulated with a momentum cutoff, which forbids the usual Yukawa term. We consider that this mechanism can help to understand the smallness of neutrino masses without a tuning of the Yukawa coupling. The prohibition of the Yukawa term for the neutrino forbids at the same time a gauge coupling between the right-handed electron and neutrino. We prove that this mechanism can be implemented on the lattice.

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