Tri-bimaximal neutrino mixing from discrete subgroups of SU(3) and SO(3) family symmetry

It has recently been shown how tri-bimaximal neutrino mixing can be achieved, using the see-saw mechanism with constrained sequential dominance, through the vacuum alignment of a broken non-Abelian gauged family symmetry such as SO(3) or SU(3). Generalising the approach of Altarelli and Feruglio developed for an A(4) model we show how the reduction of the underlying symmetry to a discrete subgroup of SO(3) or SU(3) renders this alignment a generic property of such models. This means near tri-bimaximal mixing can be quite naturally accommodated in a complete unified theory of quark and lepton masses. (c) 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.