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Testing the type-II seesaw mechanism with gravitational waves

Yonghua Wang* and Wei Chao†

  • *Contact author: yonghuawang@mail.bnu.edu.cn
  • †Contact author: chaowei@bnu.edu.cn
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Phys. Rev. D 113, 075026 – Published 20 April, 2026

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/l2q2-7fjv

Abstract

Traditional seesaw mechanisms provide an elegant theoretical framework in explaining the tiny yet nonzero masses of neutrinos. Nevertheless, they face significant challenges in experimental searches, primarily because the energy scale associated with the seesaw mechanism is too high to be directly reached by terrestrial experiments. In this paper, we explore the gravitational waves (GWs) generated via graviton bremsstrahlung during the decay of seesaw particles in the early Universe. Specifically, we compute the GW spectrum resulting from the decay of the Higgs triplet within the type-II seesaw model. Our results demonstrate that the resulting GW spectrum depends sensitively on the mass of the Higgs triplet and its couplings to the Standard Model Higgs doublet and the left-handed lepton doublets. The detection of such a high-frequency GW background could offer a unique experimental window into the seesaw mechanism and provide indirect evidence for its validity.

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Phys. Rev. D 113, 075026– Published 20 April, 2026
  • Received 14 November 2025
  • Accepted 23 March 2026
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