No Arabic abstract
I present first results from ongoing lattice investigations into the finite-temperature dynamics of stealth dark matter, which adds to the standard model a new SU(4) gauge sector with four moderately heavy fundamental fermions. This work by the Lattice Strong Dynamics Collaboration builds on past studies of direct detection and collider searches for stealth dark matter, by analyzing the early-universe SU(4) confinement transition, which produces a stochastic background of gravitational waves if it is first order. In addition to delineating the parameter space in which a first-order transition is observed, I discuss the quantities we are analyzing in order to predict the resulting gravitational-wave spectrum.
We use non-perturbative lattice calculations to investigate the finite-temperature confinement transition of stealth dark matter, focusing on the regime in which this early-universe transition is first order and would generate a stochastic background of gravitational waves. Stealth dark matter extends the standard model with a new strongly coupled SU(4) gauge sector with four massive fermions in the fundamental representation, producing a stable spin-0 dark baryon as a viable composite dark matter candidate. Future searches for stochastic gravitational waves will provide a new way to discover or constrain stealth dark matter, in addition to previously investigated direct-detection and collider experiments. As a first step to enabling this phenomenology, we determine how heavy the dark fermions need to be in order to produce a first-order stealth dark matter confinement transition.
Domain walls can form after breakdown of a discrete symmetry induced by first-order phase transition, we study the heavy dark matter produced around the temperature of the phase transition that yields the breakdown of a $mathbb{Z}_{3}$ symmetry. The generated gravitational waves by domain walls decay is found to be able to probed by the Pulsar Timing Arrays, and the future Square Kilometer Array.
We present a new model of Stealth Dark Matter: a composite baryonic scalar of an $SU(N_D)$ strongly-coupled theory with even $N_D geq 4$. All mass scales are technically natural, and dark matter stability is automatic without imposing an additional discrete or global symmetry. Constituent fermions transform in vector-like representations of the electroweak group that permit both electroweak-breaking and electroweak-preserving mass terms. This gives a tunable coupling of stealth dark matter to the Higgs boson independent of the dark matter mass itself. We specialize to $SU(4)$, and investigate the constraints on the model from dark meson decay, electroweak precision measurements, basic collider limits, and spin-independent direct detection scattering through Higgs exchange. We exploit our earlier lattice simulations that determined the composite spectrum as well as the effective Higgs coupling of stealth dark matter in order to place bounds from direct detection, excluding constituent fermions with dominantly electroweak-breaking masses. A lower bound on the dark baryon mass $m_B gtrsim 300$ GeV is obtained from the indirect requirement that the lightest dark meson not be observable at LEP II. We briefly survey some intriguing properties of stealth dark matter that are worthy of future study, including: collider studies of dark meson production and decay; indirect detection signals from annihilation; relic abundance estimates for both symmetric and asymmetric mechanisms; and direct detection through electromagnetic polarizability, a detailed study of which will appear in a companion paper.
We study the superheavy dark matter (DM) scenario in an extended $B-L$ model, where one generation of right-handed neutrino $ u_R$ is the DM candidate. If there is a new lighter sterile neutrino that co-annihilate with the DM candidate, then the annihilation rate is exponentially enhanced, allowing a DM mass much heavier than the Griest-Kamionkowski bound ($sim10^5$ GeV). We demonstrate that a DM mass $M_{ u_R}gtrsim10^{13}$ GeV can be achieved. Although beyond the scale of any traditional DM searching strategy, this scenario is testable via gravitational waves (GWs) emitted by the cosmic strings from the $U(1)_{B-L}$ breaking. Quantitative calculations show that the DM mass $mathcal{O}(10^9-10^{13}~{rm GeV})$ can be probed by future GW detectors.
We introduce a model in which the genesis of dark matter (DM) and neutrino masses is associated with a first order phase transition of a scalar singlet field. During the phase transition a source right-handed neutrino (RHN) acquires a spacetime-dependent mass dynamically, a small fraction of which is converted via resonant oscillations into a very weakly mixed dark RHN which decays to a dark matter RHN with the observed relic abundance. Neutrino masses are generated via a traditional two RHN type-I seesaw between a fourth RHN and the source neutrino. The gravitational waves produced during the phase transition have a peak frequency that increases with the DM mass, and are detectable at future gravitational wave interferometers for DM masses above ~ 1 MeV. Since the source RHNs are heavier than the electroweak scale, successful leptogenesis is also attainable.