A Sterile-Neutrino X-ray Target from the Finite-QEC Dark Sector: 8.84 keV

Abstract

A staged, pre-registered X-ray target for the framework's sterile-neutrino dark-sector state, in the same style as the w₀, wₐ dark-energy note. The hard line-position claim: the passive ν_R state in the record code has mass m_νR = α₀²Λ_QCD ≈ 17.68 keV, so its two-body radiative decay ν_R → ν + γ gives a photon line at E_γ ≈ 8.84 keV — distinct from the much-discussed 3.5 keV line, which would instead need a ~7 keV sterile mass. Two further tiers ride below it: a conditional abundance (n_νR/n_γ = α₀/208, giving Ω_νR h² = 0.0242, one-fifth of a paired zero-mode/sterile dark ledger Ω_dark h² = 0.121), and, inside the service-normalised one-denominator R4 branch (κ = 1), a single-number flux prediction with sin²(2θ) = 2.1×10⁻¹⁴ — a deliberately faint line, below near-term XRISM/Athena reach. The branch is falsified in stages: a radiative line at any energy other than 8.84/(1+z) keV kills the mass rule; a deep enough non-detection kills the κ = 1 flux branch; but a non-detection only bounds the mixing — it does not by itself refute the mass or density rules. The limiting input on the line energy is the Λ_QCD definition/scheme, so until that is fixed the honest target is a few-percent window around 8.84 keV, not a single sub-eV bin.

Keywords

How to cite

Elliman, D. (2026). A Sterile-Neutrino X-ray Target from the Finite-QEC Dark Sector: 8.84 keV. Neuro-Symbolic Ltd technical report. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.21061444

@techreport{elliman2026sterilexrayprediction,
  author      = {Elliman, David},
  title       = {A Sterile-Neutrino X-ray Target from the Finite-QEC Dark Sector: 8.84 keV},
  institution = {Neuro-Symbolic Ltd},
  year        = {2026},
  doi         = {10.5281/zenodo.21061444},
  url         = {https://neusym.ai/papers/sterile_xray_prediction}
}