Bimaximal neutrino mixing and small U_e3 from Abelian flavor symmetry

Atmospheric neutrino data strongly suggest a near-maximal ν_μ-ν_τ mixing and also solar neutrino data can be nicely explained by another near-maximal ν_e-ν_μ or ν_e-ν_τ mixing. We examine the possibility that this bimaximal mixing of atmospheric and solar neutrinos arises naturally, while keeping U_e3 and Δm_sol²/Δm_atm² small enough, as a consequence of Abelian flavor symmetry. Two simple scenarios of Abelian flavor symmetry within the supersymmetric framework are considered to obtain the desired form of the neutrino mass matrix and the charged lepton mass matrix parametrized by the Cabibbo angle λ≈0.2. Future experiments at a neutrino factory measuring the size of U_e3 and the sign of Δm₃₂² could discriminate between those scenarios as they predict distinctive values of U_e3 in connection with Δm_sol²/Δm_atm² and also with the order of the neutrino mass eigenvalues.