We propose a model where a long-lived pseudoscalar EeV particle can be produced with sufficient abundance so as to account for the cold dark matter density, despite having a Planck mass suppressed coupling to the thermal bath. Connecting this state to a hidden sterile neutrino sector through derivative couplings, induced by higher dimensional operators, allows one to account for light neutrino masses while having a lifetime that can be much larger than the age of the Universe. Moreover, the same derivative coupling accounts for the production of dark matter in the very first instant of the reheating. Given the sensitivity of the IceCube and ANITA collaborations, we study the possible signatures of such a model in the form of Ultra-High-Energy Cosmic Rays in the neutrino sector, and show that such signals could be detected in the near future.
We explore the possibility that the dark-matter relic abundance is generated in a context where the inflaton is the only mediator between the visible and the hidden sectors of our universe. Due to the relatively large mass of the inflaton field, such a portal leads to an extremely feeble interaction between the dark and the visible sectors suggesting that the dark sector cannot reach any thermal equilibrium with the visible sector. After the two sectors are populated by the decay of the inflaton, a heavy dark-matter particle thermally decouples within the dark sector. Later, a lighter dark par…
We build a model of metastable dark energy, in which the observed vacuum energy is the value of the scalar potential at the false vacuum. The scalar potential is given by a sum of even self-interactions up to order six. The deviation from the Minkowski vacuum is due to a term suppressed by the Planck scale. The decay time of the metastable vacuum can easily accommodate a mean life time compatible with the age of the universe. The metastable dark energy is also embedded into a model with $SU(2)_R$ symmetry. The dark energy doublet and the dark matter doublet naturally interact with each other. …
We show that a metastable dark matter candidate arises naturally from the conformal transformation between the Einstein metric, where gravitons are normalised states, and the Jordan metric dictating the coupling between gravity and matter. Despite being secluded from the Standard Model by a large scale above which the Jordan metric shows modifications to the Einstein frame metric, dark matter couples to the energy momentum tensor of the Higgs field in the primordial plasma primarily. This allows for the production of dark matter in a sufficient amount which complies with observations. The secl…
The formation and decay of metastable bound states can significantly decrease the thermal-relic dark matter density, particularly for dark matter masses around and above the TeV scale. Incorporating bound-state effects in the dark matter thermal decoupling requires in principle a set of coupled Boltzmann equations for the bound and unbound species. However, decaying bound states attain and remain in a quasi-steady state. Here we prove in generality that this reduces the coupled system into a single Boltzmann equation of the standard form, with an effective cross-section that describes the inte…
We point out that, in a class of gauge mediation models using metastable supersymmetry breaking vacua, the minimum of the supersymmetry breaking field in the early universe is dynamically deviated from the one in the low energy. The deviation induces coherent oscillations of the supersymmetry breaking field, which decays into the gravitinos. For certain parameters, it can produce a right amount of the gravitinos to account for the observed dark matter.
We calculate the neutrino signal resulting from annihilation of secluded dark matter in the Sun. In this class of models, dark matter annihilates first into metastable mediators, which subsequently decay into Standard Model particles. If the mediators are long lived, they will propagate out from the dense solar core before decaying. High energy neutrinos undergo absorption in the Sun. In the standard scenario in which neutrinos are produced directly in the centre of the Sun, absorption is relevant for E > 100 GeV, resulting in a significant suppression of the neutrino spectrum beyond E ~ 1 TeV…
We propose a new class of metastable dark energy (DE) phenomenological models in which the DE decay rate does not depend on external parameters such as the scale factor or the curvature of the Universe. Instead, the DE decay rate is assumed to be a constant depending only on intrinsic properties of DE and the type of a decay channel, similar to case of the radioactive decay of unstable particles and nuclei. As a consequence, the DE energy density becomes a function of the proper time elapsed since its formation, presumably in the very early Universe. Such a natural type of DE decay can profoun…
Korea Astronomy and Space Science Institute（韩国天体物理与空间科学研究所）；University of Science and Technology（科学技术大学）；Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics（大学间天文与天体物理中心）；Bogolyubov Institute for Theoretical Physics（博戈留波夫理论物理研究所）
We calculate the pair-annihilation cross section of real scalar singlet dark matter into two mono-energetic photons. We derive constraints on the theory parameter space from the Fermi limits on gamma-ray lines, and we compare with current limits from direct dark matter detection. We show that the new limits, albeit typically relevant only when the dark matter mass is close to half the Standard Model Higgs mass, rule out regions of the theory parameter space that are otherwise not constrained by other observations or experiments. In particular, the new excluded regions partly overlap with the p…
We first revisit the possibility of preserving the original flavor ratio of high energy cosmic neutrino flux by turning on a coupling between these neutrinos and ultra-light dark matter. We discuss the bound that can be set on such a coupling from the recent $ν_τ$ observation by ICECUBE and outline the implications of the coupling for the EeV range cosmic neutrino flux to be observed by upcoming neutrino detectors. We then focus on the $3+1$ scheme when the active sterile oscillation length is of order of 1000~km for EeV range cosmic neutrinos. We show that within this scenario, the probabilit…
The ANITA collaboration recently reported the detection of two anomalous upward-propagating extensive air showers exiting the Earth with relatively large emergence angles and energies in the range $\mathcal{O}(0.5\!-\!1)~\mathrm{EeV}$. We interpret these two events as coming from the decay of a massive dark-matter candidate ($m_\text{DM}\!\gtrsim\! 10^{9}~\mathrm{GeV}$) decaying into a pair of right-handed neutrinos. While propagating through the Earth, these extremely boosted decay products convert eventually to $τ$-leptons which loose energy during their propagation and produce showers in th…
Inelastic dark matter and strongly interacting dark matter are poorly constrained by direct detection experiments since they both require the scattering event to deliver energy from the nucleus into the dark matter in order to have observable effects. We propose to test these scenarios by searching for the collisional de-excitation of meta-stable nuclear isomers by the dark matter particles. The longevity of these isomers is related to a strong suppression of $γ$- and $β$-transitions, typically inhibited by a large difference in the angular momentum for the nuclear transition. The collisional …
We compute the decay spectrum for dark matter (DM) with masses above the scale of electroweak symmetry breaking, all the way to the Planck scale. For an arbitrary hard process involving a decay to the unbroken standard model, we determine the prompt distribution of stable states including photons, neutrinos, positrons, and antiprotons. These spectra are a crucial ingredient in the search for DM via indirect detection at the highest energies as being probed in current and upcoming experiments including IceCube, HAWC, CTA, and LHAASO. Our approach improves considerably on existing methods. For e…
We explore dark matter mechanisms that can simultaneously explain the galactic 511 keV gamma rays observed by INTEGRAL/SPI, the DAMA/LIBRA annual modulation, and the excess of low-recoil dark matter candidates observed by CoGeNT. It requires three nearly degenerate states of dark matter in the 4-7 GeV mass range, with splittings respectively of order an MeV and a few keV. The top two states have the small mass gap and transitions between them, either exothermic or endothermic, can account for direct detections. Decays from one of the top states to the ground state produce low-energy positrons …
We study the cutoff for the cosmic-ray neutrino, set by the scattering with cosmic background neutrinos into dark sector particles through a neutrino portal interaction. We find that a large interaction rate is still viable, when the dark sector particles are mainly coupled to the $τ-$neutrino, so that the neutrino mean free path can be reduced to be $O(10)~$Mpc over a wide energy range. If stable enough, the dark sector particle, into which most of the cosmic-ray neutrino energy is transferred, can travel across the Universe and reach the earth. The dark sector particle can carry the energy a…
We consider the effects of R-parity violation due to the inclusion of a bilinear $μ^\prime L H_u$ superpotential term in high scale supersymmetric models with an EeV scale gravitino as dark matter. Although the typical phenomenological limits on this coupling (e.g. due to lepton number violation and the preservation of the baryon asymmetry) are relaxed when the supersymmetric mass spectrum is assumed to be heavy (in excess of the inflationary scale of $3 \times 10^{13}$ GeV), the requirement that the gravitino be sufficiently long-lived so as to account for the observed dark matter density, le…
If the dark matter is unstable, the decay of these particles throughout the universe and in the halo of the Milky Way could contribute significantly to the isotropic gamma-ray background (IGRB) as measured by Fermi. In this article, we calculate the high-latitude gamma-ray flux resulting from dark matter decay for a wide range of channels and masses, including all contributions from inverse Compton scattering and accounting for the production and full evolution of cosmological electromagnetic cascades. We also make use of recent multi-wavelength analyses that constrain the astrophysical contri…
The phase of inflationary expansion in the early universe produces superheavy relics in a mass window between 10^{12} GeV and 10^{14} GeV. Decay or annihilation of these superheavy relics can explain the observed ultrahigh energy cosmic rays beyond the Greisen-Zatsepin-Kuzmin cutoff. We emphasize that the pattern of cosmic ray arrival directions with energies beyond 20 EeV will decide between the different proposals for the origin of ultrahigh energy cosmic rays.
We reanalyse the prospects for upcoming Ultra-High Energy Cosmic Ray experiments in connection with the phenomenology of Super-heavy Dark Matter. We identify a set of observables well suited to reveal a possible anisotropy in the High Energy Cosmic Ray flux induced by the decays of these particles, and quantify their performance via Monte Carlo simulations that mimic the outcome of near-future and next-generation experiments. The spherical and circular dipoles are able to tell isotropic and anisotropic fluxes apart at a confidence level as large as $4σ$ or $5σ$, depending on the Dark Matter pr…
We investigate the measurement of supersymmetric particle masses at the LHC in gravitino dark matter (GDM) scenarios where the next-to-lightest supersymmetric partner (NLSP) is the lighter scalar tau, or stau, and is stable on the scale of a detector. Such a massive metastable charged sparticle would have distinctive Time-of-Flight (ToF) and energy-loss ($dE/dx$) signatures. We summarise the documented accuracies expected to be achievable with the ATLAS detector in measurements of the stau mass and its momentum at the LHC. We then use a fast simulation of an LHC detector to demonstrate techniq…
We investigate supersymmetric models for dark matter which is represented by pseudomoduli in weakly coupled hidden sectors. We propose a scheme to add a dark matter sector to quiver gauge theories with metastable supersymmetry breaking. We discuss the embedding of such scheme in string theory and we describe the dark matter sector in terms of D7 flavour branes. We explore the phenomenology in various regions of the parameters.
Probing Non-Minimal Dark Sectors via the 21 cm Line at Cosmic Dawn
California Institute of Technology（加州理工学院）；Università degli Studi di Padova（帕多瓦大学）；Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare (INFN), Sezione di Padova（意大利国家核物理研究所帕多瓦分部）
In split-supersymmetry (split-SUSY), gluino is a metastable particle and thus can freeze out in the early universe. The late decay of such a long-life gluino into the lightest supersymmetric particle (LSP) may provide much of the cosmic dark matter content. In this work, assuming the LSP is gravitino produced from the late decay of the metastable gluino, we examine the WMAP dark matter constraints on the gluino mass. We find that to provide the full abundance of dark matter, the gluino must be heavier than about 14 TeV and thus not accessible at the CERN Large Hadron Collider (LHC).
We analyze an R-symmetry breaking deformation of the ISS model for a direct mediation of supersymmetry breaking from a metastable vacuum. The model is weakly coupled and calculable. The LSP gravitino is light (m_{3/2}<16 eV) and the MSSM spectrum is natural with a light Higgs. The supersymmetry breaking sector, which is usually hidden, is observable (m~1 TeV) and may be a candidate for cold dark matter. We discuss its production and signature at LHC. We propose a UV completion of the model in terms of a duality cascade.
We consider the possibility that dark matter and dark energy can be explained by the minimal KSVZ axion model. This is possible if the lowest energy metastable minimum of the scalar potential has zero energy density, which is possible in theoretical models of vacuum energy cancellation based on spacetime averaging and in models based on energy parity. Dark energy is then understood as being due to the energy density of the metastable electroweak vacuum relative to a second quasi-degenerate metastable minimum. The requirement of quasi-degenerate minima is a non-trivial condition which completel…
Models of dark matter with ~ GeV scale force mediators provide attractive explanations of many high energy anomalies, including PAMELA, ATIC, and the WMAP haze. At the same time, by exploiting the ~ MeV scale excited states that are automatically present in such theories, these models naturally explain the DAMA/LIBRA and INTEGRAL signals through the inelastic dark matter (iDM) and exciting dark matter (XDM) scenarios, respectively. Interestingly, with only weak kinetic mixing to hypercharge to mediate decays, the lifetime of excited states with delta < 2 m_e is longer than the age of the unive…
Astronomy at the highest energies observed must be performed by studying neutrinos rather than photons because the universe is opaque to photons of these energies. By making observations of neutrinos with energies above 10 EeV one can deduce information about the distribution and cosmological history of cosmic rays which may have been accelerated to energies above 100 EeV. Very large fluxes of neutrinos at these energies which exhibit a hard spectrum would be evidence of a GUT phase transition or superheavy dark matter particles. Neutrinos at energies around a PeV may be produced in observable…
We present a scenario where dark matter is in the form of dark atoms that can accomodate the experimentally observed excess of positrons in PAMELA and AMS-02 while being compatible with the constraints imposed on the gamma-ray flux from Fermi/LAT. This scenario assumes that the dominant component of dark matter is in the form of a bound state between a helium nucleus and a $-2$ particle and a small component is in the form of a WIMP-like dark atom compatible with direct searches in underground detectors. One of the constituents of this WIMP-like state is a $+2$ metastable particle with a mass …
We analyze the indirect astrophysical signatures of secluded models of WIMP dark matter, characterized by a weak-scale rate for annihilation into light MeV-scale mediators which are metastable to decay into Standard Model states. Such scenarios allow a significant enhancement of the annihilation cross section in the galactic halo relative to its value at freeze-out, particularly when the mediator is light enough for this process to proceed through radiative capture to a metastable `WIMP-onium' bound state. For MeV-scale vector mediators charged under a hidden U(1)' gauge group, the enhanced an…
We study a toy model in which Majorana or Dirac fermions behave as the source for a small vacuum energy in the present Universe. In the model, a self-interacting scalar boson coupled with fermions induces attractive and repulsive interactions between the fermions simultaneously. These interactions allow for the existence of a metastable state with positive energy density comprised of fermions degenerate inside a Fermi surface. The energy density of the metastable state remains constant as the Universe expands. This is because pair-productions of fermions from the vacuum continuously take place…
We investigate the power spectrum of Non-Cold Dark Matter (NCDM) produced in a state out of thermal equilibrium. We consider dark matter production from the decay of scalar condensates (inflaton, moduli), the decay of thermalized and non-thermalized particles, and from thermal and non-thermal freeze-in. For each case, we compute the NCDM phase space distribution and the linear matter power spectrum, which features a cutoff analogous to that for Warm Dark Matter (WDM). This scale is solely determined by the equation of state of NCDM. We propose a mapping procedure that translates the WDM Lyman-…
The ANtarctic Impulsive Transient Antenna (ANITA) collaboration has observed two EeV-energy, upward going events originating from below the horizon. As no standard model (SM) particles, propagating through the earth at such energy and exit angles, can give rise to the required survival probability for the observed events, several beyond standard model (BSM) proposals have come up. We propose a scenario where a $Z_2$ odd sector is responsible for such anomalous events. The next to lightest $Z_2$ odd particle or the next to lightest stable particle (NLSP), created from ultra high energy neutrino…
We propose a new physics scenario in which the decay of a very heavy dark-matter candidate which does not interact with the neutrino sector could explain the two anomalous events recently reported by ANITA. The model is composed of two components of dark matter, an unstable dark-sector state, and a massive dark gauge boson. We assume that the heavier dark-matter particle of EeV-range mass is distributed over the galactic halo and disintegrates into a pair of lighter -- highly boosted -- dark-matter states in the present universe which reach and penetrate the Earth. The latter scatters {\it in}…
Utilizing the Fermi measurement of the gamma-ray spectrum toward the Galactic Center, we derive some of the strongest constraints to date on the dark matter (DM) lifetime in the mass range from hundreds of MeV to above an EeV. Our profile-likelihood based analysis relies on 413 weeks of Fermi Pass 8 data from 200 MeV to 2 TeV, along with up-to-date models for diffuse gamma-ray emission within the Milky Way. We model Galactic and extragalactic DM decay and include contributions to the DM-induced gamma-ray flux resulting from both primary emission and inverse-Compton scattering of primary electr…
We consider a generic mechanism via which thermal relic WIMP dark matter may be decoupled from the Standard Model, namely through a combination of WIMP annihilation to metastable mediators with subsequent delayed decay to Standard Model states. We illustrate this with explicit examples of WIMPs connected to the Standard Model by metastable bosons or fermions. In all models, provided the WIMP mass is greater than that of the mediator, it can be secluded from the Standard Model with an extremely small elastic scattering cross-section on nuclei and rate for direct collider production. In contrast…
We discuss within the framework of effective four-fermion scalar interaction the phenomenology of a Weakly Interacting Massive Particle (WIMP) Dirac Dark Matter candidate which is exothermic (i.e. is metastable and interacts with nuclear targets down-scattering to a lower-mass state) and $Ge$-phobic (i.e. whose couplings to quarks violate isospin symmetry leading to a suppression of its cross section off Germanium targets). We discuss the specific example of the CDMS-II Silicon three-candidate effect showing that a region of the parameter space of the model exists where WIMP scatterings can ex…
Higgs vacuum stability has important consequences for cosmology. In particular, we argue that if the Higgs vacuum is metastable, then the dark matter cannot contain a single black hole of mass less than $10^{15}{\rm g}$ in our entire past light cone. In addition to being the destroyer microscopic black holes, it may be possible that Higgs vacuum decay is a source of primordial black holes during inflation.
The diffuse relic neutrinos with light mass are transparent to Ultrahigh energy (UHE) neutrinos at thousands EeV, born by photoproduction of pions by UHE protons on relic 2.73 K BBR radiation and originated in AGNs at cosmic distances. However these UHE $ν$s may interact with those (mainly heaviest $ν_{μ_r}$, $ν_{τ_r}$ and respective antineutrinos) clustered into HDM galactic halos. UHE photons or protons, secondaries of $νν_r$ scattering, might be the final observed signature of such high-energy chain reactions and may be responsible of the highest extragalactic cosmic-ray (CR) events. The ch…
We consider the dynamics of the supersymmetry-breaking scalar field and the production of dark matter gravitinos via its decay in a gauge-mediated supersymmetry breaking model with metastable vacuum. We find that the scalar field amplitude and gravitino density are extremely sensitive to the parameters of the hidden sector. For the case of an O'Raifeartaigh sector, we show that the observed dark matter density can be explained by gravitinos even for low reheating temperatures T_{R} < 10 GeV. Such low reheating temperatures may be implied by detection of the NLSP at the LHC if its thermal freez…
We revisit the hybrid inflation model gauged by $U(1)_{B-L}$ extension of the Minimal Supersymmetric Standard Model (MSSM) in a no-scale background. Considering a single predictive framework, we study inflation, leptogenesis, gavitino cosmology, and the stochastic background of gravitational waves produced by metastable cosmic strings. The spontaneous breaking of $U(1)_{B-L}$ at the end of inflation produces a network of metastable cosmic strings while, the interaction between $U(1)_{B-L}$ Higgs field and the neutrinos generate heavy Majorana masses for the right-handed neutrinos. The heavy Ma…
In the present paper, it is assumed that there exist two dark matter particles: superheavy dark matter particles (SHDM), whose mass $\sim$ inflaton mass, and light fermion dark matter (DM) particles which are the ultrahigh energy (UHE) products of its decay. The Earth will be taken as a detector to directly search for the UHE DM particles. These upward-going particles, which pass through the Earth and air and interact with nuclei, can be detected by the fluorescence detectors (FD) of the Pierre Auger observatory (Auger), via fluorescent photons due to the development of an EAS. The numbers and…
We present a model where sterile neutrinos with rest masses in the range ~ keV to ~ MeV can be the dark matter and be consistent with all laboratory, cosmological, large-scale structure, as well as x-ray constraints. These sterile neutrinos are assumed to freeze out of thermal and chemical equilibrium with matter and radiation in the very early Universe, prior to an epoch of prodigious entropy generation ("dilution") from out-of-equilibrium decay of heavy particles. In this work, we consider heavy, entropy-producing particles in the ~ TeV to ~ EeV rest-mass range, possibly associated with new …
We consider three classes of dark matter (DM) models to account for the recently observed 3.5 keV line: metastable excited state DM, annihilating DM, and decaying DM. We study two examples of metastable excited state DM. The first, millicharged composite DM, has both inelasticity and photon emission built in, but with a very constrained parameter space. In the second example, up-scattering and decay come from separate sectors and is thus less constrained. The decay of the excited state can potentially be detectable at direct detection experiments. However we find that CMB constraints are at th…
Many experiments exploring weakly interacting massive particles (WIMPs) such as direct, indirect and collider searches have been carried out until now. However, a clear signal of a WIMP has not been found yet and it makes us to suspect that WIMPs are questionable as a dark matter candidate. Taking into account this situation, we propose two models in which dark matter relic density is produced by decay of a metastable particle. In the first model, the metastable particle is a feebly interacting massive particle, which is the so-called FIMP produced by freeze-in mechanism in the early universe.…
Tentative evidence of a 3.5 keV X-ray line has been found in the stacked spectra of galaxy clusters, individual clusters, the Andromeda galaxy and the galactic center, leading to speculation that it could be due to decays of metastable dark matter such as sterile neutrinos. However searches for the line in other systems such as dwarf satellites of the Milky Way have given negative or ambiguous results. We reanalyze both the positive and negative searches from the point of view that the line is due to inelastic scattering of dark matter to an excited state that subsequently decays---the mechani…
Preliminary ATLAS and CMS results from the first 13 TeV LHC run have encountered an intriguing excess of events in the diphoton channel around the invariant mass of 750 GeV. We investigate a possibility that the current excess is due to a heavy resonance decaying to light metastable states, which in turn give displaced decays to very highly collimated $e^+e^-$ pairs. Such decays may pass the photon selection criteria, and successfully mimic the diphoton events, especially at low counts. We investigate two classes of such models, characterized by the following underlying production and decay ch…
A baryonic bound state with a mass of O(100) TeV, which is composed of strongly interacting messenger quarks in the low scale gauge mediation, can naturally be the cold dark matter. Interestingly, we find that such a baryonic dark matter is generically metastable, and the decay of this dark matter can naturally explain the anomalous positron flux recently observed by the PAMELA collaboration.
We consider self-annihilation of dark matter, $χ$, into metastable mediators, $Y$, and their subsequent decay into photons inside white dwarfs. We focus on reactions of the type $χ\barχ\rightarrow YY$, where mediators, besides having a finite decay lifetime at rest $τ_{\rm rest}\lesssim 1$ s, may suffer energy loss in the medium before they decay into photons, $Y \rightarrow γγ$. We obtain attenuated gamma-ray luminosities arising from the combination of both effects. Using complementary sets of astrophysical measurements from cold white dwarfs in the M4 globular cluster as well as direct/indi…
