Wash-in Lepto(flavor)genesis

Electroweak sphaleron processes can convert an initial lepton asymmetry to a baryon asymmetry, which is a key ingredient in the well-known scenario of baryogenesis via leptogenesis. Similarly, lepton-number-violating (LNV) and lepton-flavor-violating (LFV) interactions can respectively convert initial fermionic charge asymmetries to baryon-minus-lepton (B-L) and flavored baryon-minus-lepton (B/3-L_e, B/3-L_mu, B/3-L_tau) asymmetries. This observation sets the stage for a plethora of new baryogenesis models, in which first one or several charge asymmetries are produced in what may be referred to as "chargegenesis" at high temperatures and then subsequently reprocessed by LNV or LVF interactions into a LNV or LFV chemical equilibrium at lower temperatures. In this talk, I will illustrate this idea by means of a few simple examples. I will discuss how the interactions of right-handed neutrinos can wash in a baryon-minus-lepton asymmetry at temperatures as low as a few 100 TeV as well as how charged-lepton flavor violation in the early Universe can wash in flavored baryon-minus-lepton charges. In both cases, "wash-in leptogenesis" and "wash-in leptoflavorgenesis", electroweak sphalerons are then responsible for the final conversion to the baryon asymmetry of the Universe. In addition, I will highlight axion inflation coupled to the Standard Model hypercharge gauge field as a promising example of chargegenesis, which can be tested in observations of primordial magnetic fields and gravitational waves.