Vacuum stability in U(1)-prime extensions of the Standard Model with TeV scale right handed neutrinos

We investigate a minimal U(1)' extension of the Standard Model with one extra complex scalar and generic gauge charge assignments. We use a type-I seesaw mechanism with three heavy right handed neutrinos to illustrate the constraints on the charges, on their mass and on the mixing angle of the two scalars, derived by requiring the vacuum stability of the scalar potential. We focus our study on a scenario which could be accessible at the LHC, by selecting a vacuum expectation value of the extra Higgs in the TeV range and determining the constraints that emerge in the parameter space. To illustrate the generality of the approach, specific gauge choices corresponding to U(1)(B-L), U(1)(R) and U(1)(chi) are separately analyzed. Our results are based on a modified expression of one of the beta functions of the quartic couplings of the scalar potential compared to the previous literature. This is due to a change in the coefficient of the Yukawa term of the right handed neutrinos. Differently from previous analysis, we show that this coupling may destabilize the vacuum. (C) 2014 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V.