Recent observations have detected extended TeV gamma-ray emission surrounding young and middle-aged pulsars. The morphology of these "TeV halos" requires cosmic-ray diffusion to be locally suppressed by a factor of ~100-1000 compared to the typical interstellar medium. No model currently explains this suppression. We show that cosmic-ray self-confinement can significantly inhibit diffusion near pulsars. The steep cosmic-ray gradient generates Alfven waves that resonantly scatter the same cosmic-ray population, suppressing diffusion within ~20 pc of pulsars younger than ~100 kyr. In this model, TeV halos evolve through two phases, a growth phase where Alfven waves are resonantly generated and cosmic-ray diffusion becomes increasingly suppressed, and a subsequent relaxation phase where the diffusion coefficient returns to the standard interstellar value. Intriguingly, cosmic-rays are not strongly confined early in the TeV halo evolution, allowing a significant fraction of injected e+e- to escape. If these e+e- also escape from the surrounding supernova remnant, they would provide a natural explanation for the positron excess observed by PAMELA and AMS-02. Recently created TeV cosmic-rays are confined in the TeV halo, matching observations by HAWC and H.E.S.S. While our default model relaxes too rapidly to explain the confinement of TeV cosmic rays around mature pulsars, such as Geminga, models utilizing a Kraichnan turbulence spectrum experience much slower relaxation. Thus, observations of TeV halos around mature pulsars may provide a probe into our understanding of interstellar turbulence.
Recent measurements of the Geminga and B0656+14 pulsars by the gamma-ray telescope HAWC (along with earlier measurements by Milagro) indicate that these objects generate significant fluxes of very high-energy electrons. In this paper, we use the very high-energy gamma-ray intensity and spectrum of these pulsars to calculate and constrain their expected contributions to the local cosmic-ray positron spectrum. Among models that are capable of reproducing the observed characteristics of the gamma-ray emission, we find that pulsars invariably produce a flux of high-energy positrons that is similar…
We attempt to interpret the cosmic-ray positron excess by injection from the nearby pulsar Geminga, assuming a two-zone diffusion scenario and an injection spectrum with a low energy cutoff. Since the high energy positrons and electrons from Geminga can induce $γ$ rays via inverse Compton scattering, we take into account the extended $γ$-ray observations around Geminga from HAWC for $\sim 10$ TeV and from Fermi-LAT for $\mathcal{O}(10)$ GeV. According to the extended $γ$-ray observation claimed by an analysis of Fermi-LAT data, we find that Geminga could explain the positron excess for a $30\%…
We show that the cosmic-ray positron excess measured by PAMELA and AMS could be induced by Dark Matter annihilations in a local over-density. In such a context leptophilic DM is not needed and good fits to positron data, in agreement with antiproton and gamma-ray measurements, are obtained for DM annihilations to $WW$, $hh$, $ZZ$, $ t \bar t$, $b \bar b$, $q\bar q$ channels. The classic Dark Matter candidates, such as the pure supersymmetric Wino with standard thermal annihilation cross-section, can fit the positron excess, without invoking any additional assumption on Dark Matter properties.
We consider a scenario within the Minimal Supersymmetric Standard Model extended by a singlet chiral superfield, in which neutralino dark matter annihilates to light singlet-like Higgs bosons, which proceed to decay to either electron-positron or muon-antimuon pairs. Unlike neutralino annihilations in the MSSM, this model can provide a good fit to the PAMELA cosmic ray positron fraction excess. Furthermore, the singlet-like scalar Higgs can induce a large Sommerfeld enhancement and provide an annihilation rate sufficient to accommodate the observed positron excess.
We propose a new class of R-parity violating extension of MSSM with type II seesaw mechanism for neutrino masses where an unstable gravitino is the dark matter of the Universe. It decays predominantly into three leptons final states, thereby providing a natural explanation of the positron excess but no antiproton excess in the PAMELA experiment. The model can explain neutrino masses without invoking any high scale physics while keeping the pre-existing baryon asymmetry of the universe in tact.
The excess in the positron fraction reported by the PAMELA collaboration has been interpreted as due to annihilation or decay of dark matter in the Galaxy. More prosaically, it has been ascribed to direct production of positrons by nearby pulsars, or due to pion production during stochastic acceleration of hadronic cosmic rays in nearby sources. We point out that measurements of secondary nuclei produced by cosmic ray spallation can discriminate between these possibilities. New data on the titanium-to-iron ratio from the ATIC-2 experiment support the hadronic source model above and enable a pr…
Observations of the INTEGRAL satellite revealed the presence of yet unexplained excess in the central region of the Galaxy at the energies around 511 keV. These gamma-rays are produced in the process of positron annihilation, the needed rate is around $10^{42}~\mathrm{s^{-1}}$. In this short paper it is shown that \pos -emitting isotopes that are formed in interactions of subrelativistic cosmic rays (CRs) with light nuclei (CNONe) can account for a considerable fraction -- up to several tens of percent -- of $e^{+}$ production rate in the central region.
As the TeV halos around Geminga and PSR B0656+14 have been confirmed by HAWC, slow diffusion of cosmic rays could be general around pulsars, and the cosmic positron spectrum from pulsars could be significantly changed. As a consequence, the most likely pulsar source of the positron excess, Geminga, is no more a viable candidate under the additional constraint from Fermi-LAT. Moreover, the latest measurement by AMS-02 shows a clear cutoff in the positron spectrum, which sets a strict constraint on the age of the pulsar source. Considering these new developments we reanalyze the scenario in this…
The positron flux measured near Earth shows a rise with energy beyond 30 GeV. We show that this rise may be compatible with the production of positrons in $p γ$ interactions in the jets of microquasars.
We explain the excess of the antiproton fraction recently reported by the AMS-02 experiment by considering collisions between cosmic-ray protons accelerated by a local supernova remnant (SNR) and the surrounding dense cloud. The same "$pp$-collisions" provide the right ratio of daughter particles to fit the observed positron excess simultaneously in the natural model parameters. The supernova happened in relatively lower metalicity than the major cosmic-ray sources. The cutoff energy of electrons marks the supernova age of $\sim 10^{5}$ years, while the antiproton excess may extend to higher e…
It has long been suggested that nearby pulsars within $\sim 1 \,{\rm kpc}$ are the leading candidate of the 10-500 GeV cosmic-ray positron excess measured by PAMELA and other experiments. The recent measurement of surface brightness profile of TeV nebulae surrounding Geminga and PSR~B0656+14 by the High-Altitude Water Cherenkov Observatory (HAWC) suggests inefficient diffusion of particles from the sources, giving rise to a debate on the pulsar interpretation of the cosmic-ray positron excess. Here we argue that GeV observations provide more direct constraints on the positron density in the Te…
Over the last three years, several satellite and balloon observatories have suggested intriguing features in the cosmic ray lepton spectra. Most notably, the PAMELA satellite has suggested an "anomalous" rise with energy of the cosmic ray positron fraction. In this article, we summarize the global picture emerging from the data and recapitulate the main features of different types of explanations proposed. The perspectives in testing different scenarios as well as inferring some astrophysical diagnostics from current/near future experiments are also discussed.
We show that the positron excess measured by the PAMELA experiment in the region between 10 and 100 GeV may well be a natural consequence of the standard scenario for the origin of Galactic cosmic rays. The 'excess' arises because of positrons created as secondary products of hadronic interactions inside the sources, but the crucial physical ingredient which leads to a natural explanation of the positron flux is the fact that the secondary production takes place in the same region where cosmic rays are being accelerated. Therefore secondary positrons (and electrons) participate in the accelera…
Recent observations by the PAMELA and AMS-02 telescopes have uncovered an anomalous rise in the positron fraction at energies above 10~GeV. One possible explanation for this excess is the production of primary electron/positron pairs through electromagnetic cascades in pulsar magnetospheres. This process results in a high multiplicity of electron/positron pairs within the wind-termination shock of pulsar wind nebula (PWN). A consequence of this scenario is that no circular polarization should be observed within PWN, since the contributions from electrons and positrons exactly cancel. Here we n…
We consider a small extension of the standard model by adding two Majorana fermions; those are adjoint representations of the SU(2)_L and SU(3)_c gauge groups of the standard model. In this extension, the gauge coupling unification at an energy scale higher than 10^{15} GeV is realized when the masses of the triplet and the octet fermions are smaller than 10^4 GeV and 10^{12} GeV, respectively. We also show that an appropriate symmetry ensures a long lifetime of the neutral component of the triplet fermion whose thermal relic density naturally explains the observed dark matter density. The ele…
The Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer has released high-precision data for cosmic rays, and has verified an excess of positrons relative to expectations from cosmic ray interactions in the interstellar medium. An exciting and well-known possibility for the excess is production of electron-positron pairs by annihilating dark matter particles in the halo of the Galaxy. We have constructed a new scenario for propagation of cosmic rays, based on the 2000 SMILI results and various other astrophysics observations and measurements, in which the positron excess is due to secondary production. The scenario i…
We consider indirect detection of meta-stable dark matter particles decaying into a stable neutral particle and a pair of standard model fermions. Due to the softer energy spectra from the three-body decay, such models could potentially explain the AMS-02 positron excess without being constrained by the Fermi-LAT gamma-ray data and the cosmic ray anti-proton measurements. We scrutinize over different final state fermions, paying special attention to handling of the cosmic ray background and including various contributions from cosmic ray propagation with the help of the \textsc{LikeDM} package…
The cosmic-ray positron flux calculated using the cosmic-ray nuclei interactions in our Galaxy cannot explain observed data above 10 GeV. An excess in the measured positron flux is therefore open to interpretation. Nearby pulsars, located within sub-kiloparsec range of the Solar system, are often invoked as plausible sources contributing to the excess. We show that an additional, sub-dominant population of sources together with the contributions from a few nearby pulsars can explain the latest positron excess data from the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS). We simultaneously model, using the D…
The data collected by ATIC, CREAM and PAMELA all display remarkable cosmic-ray-nuclei spectrum hardening above the magnetic rigidity $\sim$ 240 GV. One natural speculation is that the primary electron spectrum also gets hardened (possibly at $\sim 80$ GV) and the hardening partly accounts for the electron/positron total spectrum excess discovered by ATIC, HESS and Fermi-LAT. If it is the case, the increasing behavior of the subsequent positron-to-electron ratio will get flattened and the spectrum hardening should be taken into account in the joint fit of the electron/psoitron data otherwise th…
Several cosmic ray experiments have measured the positron fraction up to few hundred GeV. Their data have revealed an excess of positrons above 10 GeV that is not consistent with the secondary production of these particles in the interstellar medium. A primary source like dark matter or astrophysical sources (e.g pulsars and their nebulae) were considered to account for such an excess. In this paper we analyse the possibility of a primary positron production due to pulsars. Under the assumption of equal initial spectra at the source for positrons, electrons, and gamma-rays we study the propaga…
Recently, an excess of high energy positrons in our Galaxy has been observed by AMS-02. The spectrum obtained can be best fitted with the annihilation of $\sim$ TeV dark matter particles. However, recent analysis of Dwarf galaxies by Fermi/LAT observations highly constrains the TeV dark matter annihilation cross-section, and rules out the $b\bar{b}$ and all the leptophilic channels except $4-μ$ channel. In this article, I show that the remaining possible $4-μ$ channel is also ruled out by using the observational data from cool-core clusters. Therefore, all the leptophilic channels that can acc…
We propose a dark matter explanation to simultaneously account for the excess of antiproton-to-proton and positron power spectra observed in the AMS-02 experiment while having the right dark matter relic abundance and satisfying the current direct search bounds. We extend the Higgs triplet model with a hidden gauge symmetry of $SU(2)_X$ that is broken to $Z_3$ by a quadruplet scalar field, rendering the associated gauge bosons stable weakly-interacting massive particle dark matter candidates. By coupling the complex Higgs triplet and the $SU(2)_X$ quadruplet, the dark matter candidates can ann…
Positron excess observed by PAMELA, Fermi and AMS02 may be due to dark matter (DM) pair annihilation or decay dominantly into muons. In this paper, we consider a scenario with thermal fermionic DM ($χ$) with mass $\sim O(1-2)$ TeV decaying into a dark Higgs ($ϕ$) and an active neutrino ($ν_a$) instead of the SM Higgs boson and $ν_a$. We first present a renormalizable model for this scenario with local dark $U(1)_X$ gauge symmetry, in which the DM $χ$ can be thermalized by Higgs portal and the gauge kinetic mixing. Assuming the dark Higgs ($ϕ$) mass is in the range $2 m_μ< m_ϕ< 2 m_{π^0}$, the …
The recent observation by the PAMELA satellite of a rising positron fraction up to $\sim$ 100 GeV has triggered a considerable amount of putative interpretations in terms of dark matter (DM) annihilation or decay. Here, we make a critical reassessment of such a possibility, recalling the elementary conditions with respect to the standard astrophysical background that would make it likely, showing that they are not fulfilled. Likewise, we argue that, as now well accepted, DM would need somewhat contrived properties to contribute significantly to the observed positron signal, even when including…
Cosmic ray signals from dipole-interacting dark matter annihilation are considered in the positron, antiproton and photon channels. The predicted signals in the positron channel could nicely account for the excess of positron fraction from Fermi LAT, PAMELA, HEAT and AMS-01 experiments for the dark matter mass larger than 100 GeV with a boost (enhancement) factor of 30-80. No excess of antiproton over proton ratio at the experiments also gives a severe restriction for this scenario. With the boost factors, the predicted signals from Galactic halo and signals as mono-energetic gamma-ray lines (…
The recent HAWC observations of very-high-energy $γ$-ray halo around Geminga and Monogem indicate a very slow diffusion of cosmic rays, which results in tiny contribution of positrons from these two pulsars to the local flux. This makes the cosmic positron excess anomaly observed by PAMELA and AMS-02 even more puzzling. However, from the Boron-to-Carbon ratio data one can infer that the average diffusion coefficient in the Galaxy should be much larger. In this work we propose a two-zone diffusion model that the diffusion is slow only in a small region around the source, outside of which the pr…
The gluon condensation effect in cosmic proton-proton collisions at high energy is used to explain an excess in the positron spectrum observed by AMS. We find that this excess may originate from the GC-effect in Tycho's supernova remnant.
The recent report by the PAMELA team of the observed rise in the cosmic-ray positron fraction above a few GeV and the report of an excess of cosmic-ray electrons around a few hundred GeV by the ATIC collaboration has resulted in a flurry of publications interpreting these observations either as a possible signature from the decay of dark matter or as a contribution from isolated astrophysical sources. While those interpretations are scientifically exciting, the possibility that measurements are contaminated by misidentified cosmic ray protons can not be ignored.
The local pulsar and its progenitor, SNR, can together accelerate the positron, electron and nuclei to very high energy. The famous excesses of positron(nuclei) above $20$($200$) GeV possibly come from such kind of local source. This hints that the primary electron should also hold "excess" above $200$ GeV, synchronously accelerated along with the nuclei. The recent precise measurement of sharp dropoff at 284 GeV of positron by AMS-02 experiment takes chance to study this expected electron excess. In this work, the spatially-dependent propagation with a local source is used to reproduce the sp…
The origin of the positron excess is one of the most intriguing mysteries in astroparticle physics. The recent discovery of extended $γ$-ray halos around the pulsars Geminga, Monogem and PSR J0621+3755 have brought indirect evidence that pulsar wind nebulae accelerate $e^{\pm}$ up to very-high-energy. While the precision of previous data does not permit precise evaluation of the parameters for the pulsars, we are able to find the more precise shape of the injection spectrum using new data released by HAWC and LHAASO in 2020 and 2021. We find that this is well fitten by a power-law with an expo…
Precision measurements of the positron flux in cosmic ray have revealed an unexplained bump in the spectrum around $E\simeq 300\,\mathrm{GeV}$, not clearly attributable to known astrophysical processes. We propose annihilation of dark matter of mass $m_χ= 780\,\mathrm{GeV}$ with a late-time cross section $σv = 4.63\times 10^{-24}\,\mathrm{cm^3\,s^{-1}}$ as a possible source. The nonmonotonic dependence of the annihilation rate on dark matter velocity, owing to a selective $p$-wave Sommerfeld enhancement, allows such a large signal from the Milky Way without violating corresponding constraints …
We investigate, in terms of production from pulsars and their nebulae, the cosmic ray positron and electron fluxes above $\sim10$ GeV, observed by the AMS-02 experiment up to 1 TeV. We concentrate on the Vela-X case. Starting from the gamma-ray photon spectrum of the source, generated via synchrotron and inverse Compton processes, we estimated the electron and positron injection spectra. Several features are fixed from observations of Vela-X and unknown parameters are borrowed from the Crab nebula. The particle spectra produced in the pulsar wind nebula are then propagated up to the Solar Syst…
With the accurate cosmic ray (CR) electron and positron spectra (denoted as $Φ_{\rm e^{-}}$ and $Φ_{\rm e^{+}}$, respectively) measured by AMS-02 collaboration, the difference between the electron and positron fluxes (i.e., $ΔΦ=Φ_{\rm e^{-}}-Φ_{\rm e^{+}}$), dominated by the propagated primary electrons, can be reliably inferred. In the standard model, the spectrum of propagated primary CR electrons at energies $\geq 30$ GeV softens with the increase of energy. The absence of any evidence for such a continuous spectral softening in $ΔΦ$ strongly suggests a significant `excess' of primary CR el…
The excess of positrons in cosmic rays above $\sim$10 GeV has been a puzzle since it was discovered. Possible interpretations of the excess have been suggested, including acceleration in a local supernova remnant or annihilation of dark matter particles. To discriminate between these scenarios, the positron fraction must be measured at higher energies. One technique to perform this measurement is using the Earth-Moon spectrometer: observing the deflection of positron and electron moon shadows by the Earth's magnetic field. The measurement has been attempted by previous imaging atmospheric Cher…
The Dark Matter Particle Explorer (DAMPE) satellite detector announced its first result for measuring the cosmic-ray electron/positron (CRE) energy spectrum up to 4.6TeV, including a tentative peak-like event excess at (1.3-1.5)TeV. In this work, we uncover a significant hidden excess in the DAMPE CRE spectrum over the energy range (0.6-1.1)TeV, which has a non-peak-like structure. We propose a new mechanism to explain this excess by a set of 1.5TeV $μ^\pm$ events with subsequent decays into $e^\pm$ plus neutrinos. For explaining this new excess together with the peak excess around 1.4TeV, we …
Unexpected features in the energy spectra of cosmic rays electrons and positrons have been recently observed by PAMELA and Fermi-LAT satellite experiments, opening to the exciting possibility of an indirect manifestation of new physics. A TeV-scale fourth lepton family is a natural extension of the Standard Model leptonic sector (also linked to the hierarchy problem in Minimal Walking Technicolor models). The heavy Majorana neutrino of this setup mixes with Standard Model charged leptons through a weak charged current interaction. Here, we first study analytically the energy spectrum of the el…
We calculate the extragalactic diffuse emission originating from the up-scattering of cosmic microwave photons by energetic electrons and positrons produced in particle dark matter annihilation events at all redshifts and in all halos. We outline the observational constraints on this emission and we study its dependence on both the particle dark matter model (including the particle mass and its dominant annihilation final state) and on assumptions on structure formation and on the density profile of halos. We find that for low-mass dark matter models, data in the X-ray band provide the most st…
We argue that the cosmic ray positron excess observed in ATIC-2, Fermi LAT, PAMELA, HESS and recently in the precision AMS-02 experiment can be attributed to the production in a local, middle-aged supernova remnant (SNR). Using the prediction of our model of cosmic ray acceleration in SNR we estimate that the SNR responsible for the observed positron excess is located between 250 and 320pc from the Sun and is 170-380 kyear old. The most probable candidate for such a source is the SNR which gave birth to the well-known Geminga pulsar, but is no longer visible. Other contenders are also discusse…
Measurements of cosmic-ray (CR) positron fraction by PAMELA and other experiments have found an excess above 10 GeV relative to the standard predictions for secondary production in the interstellar medium (ISM). Although the excess has been mostly suggested to arise from some primary sources of positrons (such as pulsars and or annihilating dark matter particles), the almost constant flux ratio of $e^{+}/ \bar{p}$ argues for an alternative possibility that the excess positrons and antiprotons up to the highest energies are secondary products generated in hadronic interactions. Recently, Yang \…
We extract the positron and electron fluxes in the energy range 10 - 100 GeV by combining the recent data from PAMELA and Fermi LAT. The {\it absolute positron and electron} fluxes thus obtained are found to obey the power laws: $E^{-2.65}$ and $E^{-3.06}$ respectively, which can be confirmed by the upcoming data from PAMELA. The positron flux appears to indicate an excess at energies $E\gsim 50$ GeV even if the uncertainty in the secondary positron flux is added to the Galactic positron background. This leaves enough motivation for considering new physics, such as annihilation or decay of dar…
Several groups have reported a possible excess of primary electrons at high energies with the joint fit of the positron fraction and total electron/positron spectra. With the latest release of high-precision electron/positron spectra measured by AMS-02, we further confirm this excess by fitting $ΔΦ$ $\rm(i.e., Φ_{e^-}-Φ_{e^+})$ data in this work. Then we investigate the contribution of a single nearby supernova remnant to the primary electron excess and find that Monogem can reasonably account for this excess. Moreover, we predict that the electron spectrum may harden again at a few TeVs due t…
We entertain the idea that a suitable background of cold (very low momentum) pseudoscalar particles or condensate, may trigger a background that effectively generates Lorentz-invariance violation. This aether-like background induces a Chern-Simons modification of QED. Physics is different in different frames and, in the rest frame of the pseudoscalar background, high momentum photons can decay into pairs. The threshold for such decay depends quadratically on the rest mass of the particles. This mechanism could explain in a natural way why antiprotons are absent in recent cosmic ray measurement…
Isotropic diffusion is a key assumption in many models of cosmic-ray electrons and positrons. We find that simulation results imply a critical energy of ~10-1000~GeV above which electrons and positrons can spend their entire lives in streams threading magnetic fields, due to energy losses. This would restrict the number of electron/positron sources contributing at Earth, likely leading to smooth electron/positron spectra, as is observed. For positrons, this could be as few as one, with an enhanced flux that would ease energetics concerns of a pulsar origin of the positron excess, or even zero,…
The rise in the energy spectrum of the positron ratio, observed by the PAMELA satellite above 10 GeV, and other cosmic ray measurements, have been interpreted as a possible signature of Dark Matter annihilation in the Galaxy. However, the large number of free parameters, and the large astrophysical uncertainties, make it difficult to do conclusive statements about the viability of this scenario. Here, we perform a multi-wavelength, multi-messenger analysis, that combines in a consistent way the constraints arising from different astrophysical observations. We show that if standard assumptions …
We calculate the diffuse intensity of cosmic ray (CR) nuclei and their secondaries in the Boron-Carbon group produced by supernova remnants (SNR). The trajectories of charged particles in the SNR are modeled as a random walk in the test particle approximation. Secondary production by CRs colliding with gas in the SNR is included as a Monte Carlo process, while we use Galprop to account for the propagation and interactions of CRs in the Galaxy. In the vicinity of a source, we find an approximately constant B/C ratio as a function of energy. As a result, the B/C ratio at Earth does not rise with…
The Fermi-LAT Galactic Center excess and the 511 keV positron-annihilation signal from the inner Galaxy bare a striking morphological similarity. We propose that both can be explained through a scenario in which millisecond pulsars produce the Galactic Center excess and their progenitors, low-mass X-ray binaries, the 511 keV signal. As a proof-of-principle we study a specific population synthesis scenario from the literature involving so-called ultracompact X-ray binaries. Moreover, for the first time, we quantitatively show that neutron star, rather than black hole, low-mass X-ray binaries ca…
Spectra of unbound electron-positron pairs (dielectrons, in brief) and photons from decays of parapositronia produced in ultraperipheral collisions of electrically charged objects are calculated. Their shapes at energies of the NICA collider are demonstrated. Soft dielectrons and photons are abundantly produced. The relevance of these processes to the astrophysical problem of cooling electron-positron pairs and the intense emission of 511 keV photons from the Galactic center is discussed.
We study the prospects for discriminating between the dark matter (DM) and pulsar origin of the PAMELA positron excess with the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer AMS-02. We simulate the response of AMS-02 to positrons (and electrons) originating from DM annihilations, and determine the pulsar parameters (spin-down luminosity, distance and characteristic age) that produce a satisfactory fit to the mock AMS-02 data. It turns out that it is always possible to mimic a DM signal with pulsars. Although the fit in some cases requires values of spin-down luminosity and characteristic age different from thos…
We construct a thermal dark matter model with annihilation mediated by a resonance to explain the positron excess observed by PAMELA, Fermi-LAT and AMS-02, while satisfying constraints from cosmic microwave background (CMB) measurements. The challenging requirement is that the resonance has twice the dark matter mass to one part in a million. We achieve this by introducing an $SU(3)_f$ dark flavor symmetry that is spontaneously broken to $SU(2)_f \times U(1)_f$. The resonance is the heaviest state in the dark matter flavor multiplet and the required mass relation is protected by the vacuum str…
The long standing anomaly in the positron flux as measured by the PAMELA and AMS-02 experiments could potentially be explained by dark matter (DM) annihilations. This scenario typically requires a large "boost factor" to be consistent with a thermal relic dark matter candidate produced via freeze-out. However, such an explanation is disfavored by constraints from CMB observations on energy deposition during the epoch of recombination. We discuss a scenario called late-decaying two-component dark matter (LD2DM), where the entire DM consists of two semi-degenerate species. Within this framework,…
Cosmic-ray positrons have long been considered a powerful probe of dark matter annihilation. In particular, myriad studies of the unexpected rise in the positron fraction have debated its dark matter or pulsar origins. In this paper, we instead examine the potential for extremely precise positron measurements by AMS-02 to probe hard leptophilic dark matter candidates that do not have spectral features similar to the bulk of the observed positron excess. Utilizing a detailed cosmic-ray propagation model that includes a primary positron flux generated by Galactic pulsars in addition to a seconda…
Electron and positron fluxes in cosmic rays are currently measured with unprecedented precision by AMS-02 up to TeV energies, and represent unique probes for the local properties of our Galaxy. The interpretation of their spectra is at present still debated, especially for the excess of positrons above 10 GeV. The hypothesis that pulsars can significantly contribute to this excess has been consolidated after the observation of gamma-ray halos at TeV energies of a few degree size around Geminga and Monogem pulsars. However, the spatial and energetic Galactic distribution of pulsars and the deta…
Antimatter cosmic-rays are used to probe new phenomena in physics, including dark matter annihilation. We use the cosmic-ray positron fraction spectrum by the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer, to search for such an annihilation signal in the Galaxy. We focus on dark matter with mass between 5 and 120 GeV, producing high-energy electrons and positrons. In these cosmic-ray energies the interplay of multiple astrophysical sources and phenomena, makes this search highly sensitive to the underlying astrophysical background assumptions. We use a vast public library of astrophysical models for the cosmic-…
