Abstract
The Big Bang nucleosynthesis (BBN) process in the presence of charged massive particles (CHAMPs) is studied in detail. All currently known effects due to the existence of bound states between CHAMPs and nuclei, including possible late-time destruction of 6Li and 7Li, are included. The study sets conservative bounds on CHAMP abundances in the decay time range 3\times 10^2~\mathrm {s}\lesssim \tau_x\lesssim 10^{12}~\mathrm {s} . It is stressed that the production of 6Li at early times T~10 keV is overestimated by a factor ~10 when the approximation of the Saha equation for the 4He bound state fraction is utilized. To obtain conservative limits on the abundance of CHAMPs, a Monte Carlo analysis with ~3 × 106 independent BBN runs, varying the reaction rates of 19 different reactions, is performed. The analysis yields the surprising result that, except for small areas in the particle parameter space, conservative constraints on the abundance of decaying charged particles are currently very close to those of neutral particles. It is shown that, in the case that the rates of a number of heretofore unconsidered reactions may be determined reliably in the future, it is conceivable that the limit on CHAMPs in the early Universe could be tightened by orders of magnitude.