Subscribe to the gold package and get unlimited access to Shamra Academy
Register a new userConstraints on Dark Matter from the Moon
132
0
0.0
(
0
)
Ask ChatGPT about the research
No Arabic abstract
New and complimentary constraints are placed on the spin-independent interactions of dark matter with baryonic matter. Similar to the Earth and other planets, the Moon does not have any major internal heat source. We derive constraints by comparing the rate of energy deposit by dark matter annihilations in the Moon to 12 mW/m$^2$ as measured by the Apollo mission. For light dark matter of mass $mathcal{O}(10)$ GeV, we also examine the possibility of dark matter annihilations in the Moon limb. In this case, we place constraints by comparing the photon flux from such annihilations to that of the Fermi-LAT measurement of $10^{-4}$ MeV/cm$^2$s. This analysis excludes spin independent cross section $gtrsim 10^{-37}$ $rm{cm}^2$ for dark matter mass between 30 and 50 GeV.
rate research
Read More
Scatterings of galactic dark matter (DM) particles with the constituents of celestial bodies could result in their accumulation within these objects. Nevertheless, the finite temperature of the medium sets a minimum mass, the evaporation mass, that DM particles must have in order to remain trapped. DM particles below this mass are very likely to scatter to speeds higher than the escape velocity, so they would be kicked out of the capturing object and escape. Here, we compute the DM evaporation mass for all spherical celestial bodies in hydrostatic equilibrium, spanning the mass range $[10^{-10} - 10^2]~M_odot$. We illustrate the critical importance of the exponential tail of the evaporation rate, which has not always been appreciated in recent literature, and obtain a robust result: for the geometric value of the scattering cross section and for interactions with nucleons, the DM evaporation mass for all spherical celestial bodies in hydrostatic equilibrium is approximately given by $E_c/T_chi sim 30$, where $E_c$ is the escape energy of DM particles at the core of the object and $T_chi$ is the DM temperature. The minimum value of the DM evaporation mass is obtained for super-Jupiters and brown dwarfs, $m_{rm evap} simeq 0.7$ GeV. For other values of the scattering cross section, the DM evaporation mass only varies by a factor of two or less within the range $10^{-41}~textrm{cm}^2 leq sigma_p leq 10^{-31}~textrm{cm}^2$, where $sigma_p$ is the spin-independent DM-nucleon scattering cross section. Its dependence on parameters such as the local galactic DM density and velocity, or the scattering and annihilation cross sections is only logarithmic.
Dwarf spheroidal galaxies are excellent systems to probe the nature of fermionic dark matter due to their high observed dark matter phase-space density. In this work, we review, revise and improve upon previous phase-space considerations to obtain lower bounds on the mass of fermionic dark matter particles. The refinement in the results compared to previous works is realised particularly due to a significantly improved Jeans analysis of the galaxies. We discuss two methods to obtain phase-space bounds on the dark matter mass, one model-independent bound based on Paulis principle, and the other derived from an application of Liouvilles theorem. As benchmark examples for the latter case, we derive constraints for thermally decoupled particles and (non-)resonantly produced sterile neutrinos. Using the Pauli principle, we report a model-independent lower bound of $m geq 0.18,mathrm{keV}$ at 68% CL and $m geq 0.13,mathrm{keV}$ at 95% CL. For relativistically decoupled thermal relics, this bound is strengthened to $m geq 0.59,mathrm{keV}$ at 68% CL and $m geq 0.41,mathrm{keV}$ at 95% CL, whilst for non-resonantly produced sterile neutrinos the constraint is $m geq 2.80,mathrm{keV}$ at 68% CL and $m geq 1.74,mathrm{keV}$ at 95% CL. Finally, the phase-space bounds on resonantly produced sterile neutrinos are compared with complementary limits from X-ray, Lyman-$alpha$ and Big Bang Nucleosynthesis observations.
The extended excess toward the Galactic Center (GC) in gamma rays inferred from Fermi-LAT observations has been interpreted as being due to dark matter (DM) annihilation. Here, we perform new likelihood analyses of the GC and show that, when including templates for the stellar galactic and nuclear bulges, the GC shows no significant detection of a DM annihilation template, even after generous variations in the Galactic diffuse emission models and a wide range of DM halo profiles. We include Galactic diffuse emission models with combinations of three-dimensional inverse Compton maps, variations of interstellar gas maps, and a central source of electrons. For the DM profile, we include both spherical and ellipsoidal DM morphologies and a range of radial profiles from steep cusps to kiloparsec-sized cores, motivated in part by hydrodynamical simulations. Our derived upper limits on the dark matter annihilation flux place strong constraints on DM properties. In the case of the pure $b$-quark annihilation channel, our limits on the annihilation cross section are more stringent than those from the Milky Way dwarfs up to DM masses of approximately TeV and rule out the thermal relic cross section up to approximately 300 GeV. Better understanding of the DM profile, as well as the Fermi-LAT data at its highest energies, would further improve the sensitivity to DM properties.
We set conservative, robust constraints on the annihilation and decay of dark matter into various Standard Model final states under various assumptions about the distribution of the dark matter in the Milky Way halo. We use the inclusive photon spectrum observed by the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope through its main instrument, the Large-Area Telescope (LAT). We use simulated data to first find the optimal regions of interest in the gamma-ray sky, where the expected dark matter signal is largest compared with the expected astrophysical foregrounds. We then require the predicted dark matter signal to be less than the observed photon counts in the a priori optimal regions. This yields a very conservative constraint as we do not attempt to model or subtract astrophysical foregrounds. The resulting limits are competitive with other existing limits, and, for some final states with cuspy dark-matter distributions in the Galactic Center region, disfavor the typical cross section required during freeze-out for a weakly interacting massive particle (WIMP) to obtain the observed relic abundance.
It has been argued that the existence of old neutron stars excludes the possibility of non-annihilating light bosonic dark matter, such as that arising in asymmetric dark matter scenarios. If non-annihilating dark matter is captured by neutron stars, the density will eventually become sufficient for black hole formation. However, the dynamics of collapse is highly sensitive to dark-matter self-interactions. Repulsive self-interactions, even if extremely weak, can prevent black hole formation. We argue that self-interactions will necessarily be present, and estimate their strength in representative models. We also consider co-annihilation of dark matter with nucleons, which arises naturally in many asymmetric dark matter models, and which again acts to prevent black hole formation. We demonstrate how the excluded region of the dark-matter parameter space shrinks as the strength of such interactions is increased, and conclude that neutron star observations do not exclude most realistic bosonic asymmetric dark matter models.
Log in to be able to interact and post comments
comments
Fetching comments
Sign in to be able to follow your search criteria
