Symmetries and Conservation Laws in Neutrino Physics

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Abstract
The basic conservation laws of neutrino physics are described, and the experimental limits on their validity are discussed. The best limit comes from double beta decay, and it shows that lepton number and helicity are conserved in charged weak current processes to order 3 × 10 −4 . No such limits are available for the recently discovered neutral currents, and so the speculation is made that there may be a large breakdown of the usual helicity rule for neutrinos in neutral current interactions. Experiments to test this speculation are suggested in neutrino scattering off various targets, in neutral beta decay, and in pseudoscalar meson decay. The roles of iso‐spin and strangeness in neutral currents are also discussed. Predictions based upon lepton conservation and helicity are made for the decay distributions of heavy leptons.

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