The rate of dark matter-electron scattering depends on the underlying velocity distribution of the dark matter halo. Importantly, dark matter-electron scattering is particularly sensitive to the high-velocity tail, which differs significantly amongst the various dark matter halo models. In this work, we summarize the leading halo models and discuss the various parameters which enter them. We recommend updated values for these parameters based on recent studies and measurements. Furthermore, we quantify the dependence of the dark matter-electron scattering rate on the choice of halo model and parameters, and demonstrate how these choices propagate to the predicted cross-section limits. The rate is most sensitive to changes in the circular velocity v0; in silicon targets, we find that the changes in the rate predictions can range from O(0.01%) to O(100%) for contact interactions and O(10%) to O(100%) for long-range interactions.
A fraction of the dark matter in the solar neighborhood might be composed of non-galactic particles with speeds larger than the escape velocity of the Milky Way. The non-galactic dark matter flux would enhance the sensitivity of direct detection experiments, due to the larger momentum transfer to the target. In this note, we calculate the impact of the dark matter flux from the Local Group and the Virgo Supercluster diffuse components in nuclear and electron recoil experiments. The enhancement in the signal rate can be very significant, especially for experiments searching for dark matter indu…
Dissipative dark matter, such as mirror dark matter and related hidden sector dark matter candidates, requires an energy source to stabilize dark matter halos in spiral galaxies. It has been proposed previously that supernovae could be the source of this energy. Recently, it has been argued that this mechanism might explain two galactic scaling relations inferred from observations of spiral galaxies. One of which is that $ρ_0 r_0$ is roughly constant, and another relates the galactic luminosity to $r_0$. [$ρ_0$ is the dark matter central density and $r_0$ is the core radius.] Here we derive eq…
Recently, it was suggested that the gamma rays observed by the Fermi Gamma Ray Space Telescope from the direction of the galactic center could surprisingly well be described by a dark matter annihilation scenario, both in terms of their angular distribution and energy spectrum. Here, I point out that such a scenario would be in considerable tension with existing antiproton data, in particular the new PAMELA measurements. Radio data are even more constraining, thus disfavoring the dark matter hypothesis and making an astrophysical explanation of the observations much more plausible.
A new scenario for creation of galactic magnetic fields is proposed which is operative at the cosmological epoch of the galaxy formation, and which relies on unconventional properties of dark matter. Namely, it requires existence of feeble but long range interaction between the dark matter particles and electrons. In particular, millicharged dark matter particles or mirror particles with the photon kinetic mixing to the usual photon can be considered. We show that in rotating protogalaxies circular electric currents can be generated by the interactions of free electrons with dark matter partic…
We introduce a novel dark matter scenario where the visible sector and the dark sector share a common asymmetry. The two sectors are connected through an unstable mediator with baryon number one, allowing the standard model baryon asymmetry to be shared with dark matter via semi-annihilation. The present-day abundance of dark matter is then set by thermal freeze-out of this semi-annihilation process, yielding an asymmetric version of the WIMP miracle as well as promising signals for indirect detection experiments. As a proof of concept, we find a viable region of parameter space consistent wit…
We demonstrate that dark matter heating of gas clouds hundreds of parsecs from the Milky Way Galactic center provides a powerful new test of dark matter interactions. To illustrate, we set a leading bound on nucleon scattering for 10-100 MeV mass dark matter. We also constrain millicharged dark matter models, including those proposed to match the recent EDGES 21 cm absorption anomaly. For Galactic center gas clouds, galactic fields' magnetic deflection of electromagnetically charged dark matter is mitigated, because the magnetic fields around the Galactic center are poloidal, as opposed to bei…
Infall of cold dark matter on a galaxy may result in caustic rings where the particle density is enhanced. They may be searched for as features in the galactic rotation curves. Previous studies suggested the evidence for these caustic rings with universal, that is common for different galaxies, parameters. Here we test this hypothesis with a large independent set of rotation curves by means of an improved statistical method. No evidence for universal caustic rings is found in the new analysis.
The high positron production rate required to explain the flux of 511 keV gamma rays from the galactic center has inspired many models in which dark matter creates positrons. These models include the annihilation of light dark matter and scattering of dark matter with excited states (exciting dark matter). We show that existing cosmic microwave background data robustly constrains such models when the annihilation or scattering cross section is not velocity suppressed depending on the model of the galactic dark matter halo. Upcoming data from the Planck mission can exclude the fiducial Via Lact…
If dark matter is dissipative then the distribution of dark matter within galactic halos can be governed by dissipation, heating and hydrostatic equilibrium. Previous work has shown that a specific model, in the framework of mirror dark matter, can explain several empirical galactic scaling relations. It is shown here that this dynamical halo model implies a quasi-isothermal dark matter density, $ρ(r) = ρ_0 r_0^2/(r^2 + r_0^2)$, where the core radius, $r_0$, scales with disk scale length, $r_D$, via $r_0/{\rm kpc} = 1.4\left(r_D/{\rm kpc}\right)$. Additionally, the product $ρ_0 r_0$ is roughly…
Annihilation radiation from neutralino dark matter at the Galactic center (GC) would be greatly enhanced if the dark matter were strongly clustered around the supermassive black hole (SBH). The existence of a dark-matter "spike" is made plausible by the observed, steeply-rising stellar density near the GC SBH. Here the time-dependent equations describing gravitational interaction of the dark matter particles with the stars are solved. Scattering of dark matter particles by stars would substantially lower the dark matter density near the GC SBH over 10^10 yr, due both to kinetic heating, and to…
We consider the lightest supersymmetric particle (LSP), neutralino in minimal anomaly mediated supersymmetry breaking model (mAMSB) to be a possible candidate for weakly interacting massive particles (WIMP) or cold dark matter and investigate its direct and indirect detections. The theoretically allowed supersymmetric parametric space for such a model along with the recent bounds from LHC is constrained by the WMAP results for relic densities. The spin independent and spin dependent scattering cross sections for dark matter off nucleon are thus constrained from the WMAP results. They are found…
We perform a numerical comparison between the fuzzy dark matter model and the cold dark matter model, focusing on formation of satellite galaxy planes around massive galaxies. Such galactic dynamics with controlled initial subhalo configurations are investigated using GADGET2 for the cold dark matter and PyUltraLight for the fuzzy dark matter, respectively. We demonstrate that satellite galaxies in the fuzzy dark matter side have a tendency to form more flattened and corotating satellite systems than in the cold dark matter side mainly due to the dissipation by the gravitational cooling effect…
Galactic magnetic fields seeded by ultralight dark photons
Colorado State University（科罗拉多州立大学）；University of Pittsburgh（匹兹堡大学）；Queen’s University（女王大学）；Arthur B. McDonald Canadian Astroparticle Physics Research Institute（阿瑟·B·麦克唐纳加拿大天体粒子物理研究所）；Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics（理论物理前沿研究所）；York University（约克大学）；Institute of Theoretical Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences（中国科学院理论物理研究所）
Particle dark matter near the galactic center is accreted by the central black hole into a dense spike, strongly enhancing its annihilation rate. Searching for its annihilation products may give us information on the presence or absence of a central cusp in the dark halo profile. We summarize our paper Phys Rev Lett 83, 1719 (1999), and use an updated limit on the neutrino emission from the galactic center.
Could there be a large population of intermediate-mass black holes (IMBHs) formed in the early universe? Whether primordial or formed in Population III, these are likely to be very subdominant compared to the dark matter density, but could seed early dwarf galaxy/globular cluster and supermassive black hole formation. Via survival of dark matter density spikes, we show here that a centrally concentrated relic population of IMBHs, along with ambient dark matter, could account for the Fermi gamma-ray "excess" in the Galactic center because of dark matter particle annihilations.
If dark matter decays into electrons and positrons, it can affect Galactic radio emissions and the local cosmic ray fluxes. We propose a new, more general analysis of constraints on dark matter. The constraints can be obtained for any decaying dark matter model by convolving the specific dark matter decay spectrum with a response function. We derive this response function from full-sky radio surveys at 408 MHz, 1.42 GHz and 23 GHz, as well as from the positron flux recently reported by PAMELA. We discuss the influence of astrophysical uncertainties on the response function, such as from propag…
The nature of the cosmological dark matter remains elusive. Recent studies have advocated the possibility that dark matter could be composed of ultra-light, self-interacting bosons, forming a Bose-Einstein condensate in the very early Universe. We consider models which are charged under a global U(1)-symmetry such that the dark matter number is conserved. It can then be described as a classical complex scalar field which evolves in an expanding Universe. We present a brief review on the bounds on the model parameters from cosmological and galactic observations, along with the properties of gal…
Synchrotron emission from electron cosmic ray populations can be used to study both cosmic rays physics and WIMP dark matter imprints on radio skymaps. We used available radio data - from MHz to GHz - to analyze the contribution from galactic WIMP annihilations and impose constraints on WIMP observables: annihilation cross section, channel and mass. Depending on the annihilation channel we obtain as competitive bounds as those obtained in FERMI-LAT gamma ray analysis of dwarf satellite galaxies.
Resonant interactions between neutrinos from a Galactic supernova and dark matter particles can lead to a sharp dip in the neutrino energy spectrum. Due to its excellent energy resolution, measurement of this effect with the JUNO experiment can provide evidence for such couplings. We discuss how JUNO may confirm or further constrain a model where scalar dark matter couples to active neutrinos and another fermion.
We have built a lepton-specific next-to-minimal two-Higgs-doublet-portal vector dark matter model. The vector dark matter in the hidden sector does not directly couple to the visible sector, but instead annihilates into the hidden Higgs bosons which decay through a small coupling into the CP-odd Higgs bosons. In this model, the Galactic center gamma-ray excess is mainly due to the 2-step cascade annihilation with $τ$'s in the final state. The obtained mass of the CP-odd Higgs $A$ in the Galactic center excess fit can explain the muon $g-2$ anomaly at the 2$σ$ level without violating the string…
Statistical evidence has previously suggested that the Galactic Center GeV Excess (GCE) originates largely from point sources, and not from annihilating dark matter. We examine the impact of unmodeled source populations on identifying the true origin of the GCE using non-Poissonian template fitting (NPTF) methods. In a proof-of-principle example with simulated data, we discover that unmodeled sources in the Fermi Bubbles can lead to a dark matter signal being misattributed to point sources by the NPTF. We discover striking behavior consistent with a mismodeling effect in the real Fermi data, f…
Cold gas clouds recently discovered hundreds of parsecs from the center of the Milky Way Galaxy have the potential to detect dark matter. With a detailed treatment of gas cloud microphysical interactions, we determine Galactic Center gas cloud temperatures, free electron abundances, atomic ionization fractions, heating rates, cooling rates, and find how these quantities vary with metallicity. Considering a number of different dark sector heating mechanisms, we set new bounds on ultra-light dark photon dark matter for masses $10^{-22}-10^{-10}$ eV, vector portal dark matter coupled through a su…
Indirect detection signals from dark matter annihilation are studied in the positron channel. We discuss in detail the positron propagation inside the galactic medium: we present novel solutions of the diffusion and propagation equations and we focus on the determination of the astrophysical uncertainties which affect the positron dark matter signal. We show that, especially in the low energy tail of the positron spectra at Earth, the uncertainty is sizeable and we quantify the effect. Comparison of our predictions with current available and foreseen experimental data are derived.
By performing numerical simulations, we discuss the collisional dynamics of stable solitary waves in the Schrodinger-Poisson equation. In the framework of a model in which part or all of dark matter is a Bose-Einstein condensate of ultralight axions, we show that these dynamics can naturally account for the relative displacement between dark and ordinary matter in the galactic cluster Abell 3827, whose recent observation is the first empirical evidence of dark matter interactions beyond gravity. The essential assumption is the existence of solitonic galactic cores in the kiloparsec scale. For …
If the gamma-ray excess from the galactic center reported by Fermi-LAT is a signal from annihilating dark matter, one must question why a similar excess has not been observed in dwarf spheroidal galaxies. We use this observation to place constraints on the density profile of dwarf spheroidal galaxies under the assumption that the galactic center excess is in fact a signal from annihilating dark matter. We place constraints on the generalized NFW parameter $γ$ and the Einasto profile parameter $α$ which control the logarithmic slope of the inner regions of the halo's density profile. We determi…
In this paper we calculate the Galactic positron flux from dark matter annihilation in the frame of supersymmetry, taking the enhancement of the flux by existence of dark matter substructures into account. The propagation of positrons in the Galactic magnetic field is solved in a realistic numerical model GALPROP. The secondary positron flux is recalculated in the GLAPROP model. The total positron flux from secondary products and dark matter annihilation can fit the HEAT data well when taking a cuspy density profile of the substructures.
We incorporate Milky Way dark matter halo profile uncertainties, as well as an accounting of diffuse gamma-ray emission uncertainties in dark matter annihilation models for the Galactic Center Extended gamma-ray excess (GCE) detected by the Fermi Gamma Ray Space Telescope. The range of particle annihilation rate and masses expand when including these unknowns. However, two of the most precise empirical determinations of the Milky Way halo's local density and density profile leave the signal region to be in considerable tension with dark matter annihilation searches from combined dwarf galaxy a…
Motivated by the gamma-ray excess observed from the region surrounding the Galactic Center, we explore particle dark matter models that could potentially account for the spectrum and normalization of this signal. Taking a model-independent approach, we consider an exhaustive list of tree-level diagrams for dark matter annihilation, and determine which could account for the observed gamma-ray emission while simultaneously predicting a thermal relic abundance equal to the measured cosmological dark matter density. We identify a wide variety of models that can meet these criteria without conflict…
We present the effective $J$-factors for the Milky Way for scenarios in which dark matter annihilation is p-wave or d-wave suppressed. We find that the velocity suppression of dark matter annihilation can have a sizable effect on the morphology of a potential dark matter annihilation signal in the Galactic Center. The gamma-ray flux from the innermost region of the Galactic Center is in particular suppressed. We find that for dark matter density profiles with steep inner slopes, the morphology of the Inner Galaxy gamma-ray emission in p-wave models can be made similar to the morphology in stan…
Dark sectors with Abelian gauge symmetries can interact with ordinary matter via kinetic mixing. In such scenarios, magnetic monopoles of a broken dark $U(1)$ will appear in our sector as confined milli-magnetically charged objects under ordinary electromagnetism. Halo ellipticity constraints are shown to significantly bound the strength of dark magnetic Coulomb monopole interactions. The bound monopole ground state, which in vacuum is stable and has no magnetic charge or moment, is shown to become quantum mechanically unstable in the presence of an external, ordinary magnetic field. If these …
We perform a geometric analysis for the sky map of the IceCube TeV-PeV neutrino excess and test its compatibility with the sky map of decaying dark matter signals in our galaxy. Using both Kolmogorov-Smirnov and the likelihood-ratio tests, we have found that the observed event sky map prefers to have a combination of the galactic dark matter and a homogeneous background contributions, compared to a purely galactic dark matter origin. For the assumption that the galactic dark matter is responsible for all neutrino excess, the current data can also exclude a wide range of dark matter profiles ex…
The dark matter spike induced by the adiabatic growth of a massive black hole in a cuspy environment, may explain the thermal dark matter density required to fit the cut-off in the HESSJ1745-290 gamma-ray spectra as TeV dark matter signal with a background component. The spike extension appears comparable with the HESS angular resolution.
An excess of gamma rays has been identified at the centre of the Milky Way, and annihilation of dark matter has been posited as a potential source. This hypothesis faces significant challenges: difficulty characterizing astrophysical backgrounds, the need for a non-trivial adiabatic contraction of the inner part of the Milky Way's dark matter halo, and recent observations of photon clustering, which suggest that the majority of the excess is due to unresolved point sources. Here we point out that the apparent point-like nature of the emission rules out the dark matter interpretation of the exc…
In this work I use astrometric and spectroscopic data on the S2 star at the Galactic Centre (GC) up to 2016 to derive specific constraints on the size of a dark matter (DM) spike around the central supermassive black hole Sgr A*. These limits are the best direct constraints on a DM spike at the GC for non-annihilating DM and exclude a spike with radius greater than a few tens of parsecs for cuspy outer halos and a few hundred parsecs for cored outer halos.
In a large region of the supersymmetry parameter space, the annihilation cross section for neutralino dark matter is strongly dependent on the relative velocity of the incoming particles. We explore the consequences of this velocity dependence in the context of indirect detection of dark matter from the galactic center. We find that the increase in the annihilation cross section at high velocities leads to a flattening of the halo density profile near the galactic center and an enhancement of the annihilation signal.
For any realistic halo profile, the Galactic Center is predicted to be the brightest source of gamma-rays from dark matter annihilations. Due in large part to uncertainties associated with the dark matter distribution and astrophysical backgrounds, however, the most commonly applied constraints on the dark matter annihilation cross section have been derived from other regions, such as dwarf spheroidal galaxies. In this article, we study Fermi Gamma-Ray Space Telescope data from the direction of the inner Galaxy and derive stringent upper limits on the dark matter's annihilation cross section. …
Recent, very accurate simulations of galaxy formation have revealed that the standard cold dark matter model has great difficulty in explaining the detailed structure of galaxies. One of the major problems is that galactic halos are too centrally concentrated. Dark matter self-interactions have been proposed as a possible means of resolving this inconsistency. Here, we investigate quantitatively the effect of dark matter self interactions on formation of galactic halos. Our numerical framework is extremely simple, while still keeping the essential physics. We confirm that strongly self-interac…
Energetic positrons produced in annihilation or decay of dark matter particles in the Milky Way can serve as an important indirect signature of dark matter. Computing the positron flux expected in a given dark matter model involves solving transport equations, which account for interaction of positrons with matter and galactic magnetic fields. Existing calculations solve the equations inside the diffusion zone, where galactic magnetic fields confine positrons, and assume vanishing positron density on the boundaries of this zone. However, in many models, a substantial fraction of the dark matte…
Extra dimensions offer new ways to address long-standing problems in beyond the standard model particle physics. In some classes of extra-dimensional models, the lightest Kaluza-Klein particle is a viable dark matter candidate. In this work, we study indirect detection of Kaluza-Klein dark matter via its annihilation into antiprotons. We use a sophisticated galactic cosmic ray diffusion model whose parameters are fully constrained by an extensive set of experimental data. We discuss how fluxes of cosmic antiprotons can be used to exclude low Kaluza-Klein masses.
Hidden sector dark matter (DM) models with local dark gauge symmetry make a natural playground for the $γ$-ray excess from the galactic center (GC). In this paper, we first discuss in detail the GC $γ$-ray excess in scalar dark matter model with local $Z_{3}$ symmetry which was recently proposed by the present authors. Within this model, scalar DM with mass $30-70$GeV is allowed due to newly-opened (semi-)annihilation channels of DM pair into dark Higgs $ϕ$ and/or dark photon $Z^{'}$ pair, and can fit the $γ$-ray spectrum from the GC. Then we argue that the GC gamma ray excess can be easily ac…
The self-consistent spatial distribution of particles of Galactic dark matter is derived including their own gravitational potential, as also that of the visible matter of the Galaxy. In order to reproduce the observed rotation curve of the Galaxy the value of the dispersion velocity of the dark matter particles, $\rmsveldm$, should be $\sim 600\kmps$ or larger.
We present a classically scale-invariant model with a confining dark sector, which is coupled to the Standard Model through the Higgs portal. The galactic centre gamma ray excess can be explained in this model by collision-induced dark matter decays to b-quarks. We discuss the possibility to obtain the dark matter relic density through thermal freeze-out, which however requires excessive fine-tuning. We then instead focus on a freeze-in scenario and perform detailed calculations and a parameter scan. We find that the observed relic density and the gamma ray excess can be explained by a wide ra…
We propose a unified framework that reconciles the stunning success of MOND on galactic scales with the triumph of the LambdaCDM model on cosmological scales. This is achieved through the physics of superfluidity. Dark matter consists of self-interacting axion-like particles that thermalize and condense to form a superfluid in galaxies, with ~mK critical temperature. The superfluid phonons mediate a MOND acceleration on baryonic matter. Our framework naturally distinguishes between galaxies (where MOND is successful) and galaxy clusters (where MOND is not): dark matter has a higher temperature…
Cosmic-ray boosted inelastic dark matter from neutrino-emitting active galactic nuclei
Virginia Tech（弗吉尼亚理工大学）；Massachusetts Institute of Technology（麻省理工学院）；Harvard University（哈佛大学）；The Pennsylvania State University（宾夕法尼亚州立大学）；Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory（费米国家加速实验室）；University of Chicago（芝加哥大学）
In this paper, we will discuss a specific case that the dark matter particles annihilate into right-handed neutrinos. We calculate the predicted gamma-ray excess from the galactic center and compare our results with the data from the Fermi-LAT. An approximately 10-60 GeV right-handed neutrino with heavier dark matter particle can perfectly explain the observed spectrum. The annihilation cross section $\langle σv \rangle$ falls within the range $0.5$-$4 \times 10^{-26} \text{ cm}^3/\text{s}$, which is roughly compatible with the WIMP annihilation cross section.
Many models currently exist which attempt to interpret the excess of gamma rays emanating from the Galactic Center in terms of annihilating or decaying dark matter. These models typically exhibit a variety of complicated cascade mechanisms for photon production, leading to a non-trivial kinematics which obscures the physics of the underlying dark sector. In this paper, by contrast, we observe that the spectrum of the gamma-ray excess may actually exhibit an intriguing "energy-duality" invariance under $E_γ\rightarrow E_\ast^2/E_γ$ for some $E_\ast$. As we shall discuss, such an energy duality …
As is well known, most of the baryons are observationally unaccounted. Moreover, certain recent developments suggest that dark baryons are mostly locked up in galactic halos - which are anyway dominated by nonbaryonic dark matter - and a sizable fraction of them consists of gas clouds. While a priori various forms of baryonic dark matter in galaxies can be conceived, observational constraints rule out most of the possibilities, leaving brown dwarfs and cold gas clouds mostly made of H_2 as the only viable candidates. So, it looks natural to suppose that baryonic dark matter in galaxies is acco…
In most supersymmetic models, neutralino dark matter particles are predicted to accumulate in the Galactic center and annihilate generating, among other products, gamma rays. The EGRET experiment has made observations in this region, and is sensitive to gamma rays from 30 MeV to $\sim$30 GeV. We have used an improved point source analysis including an energy dependent point spread function and an unbinned maximum likelihood technique, which has allowed us to significantly lower the limits on gamma ray flux from the Galactic center. We find that the present EGRET data can limit many supersymmet…
We examine the possibility that energetic Standard Model particles contained in the jets produced by active galactic nuclei (AGN) may scatter off of the dark matter halo which is expected to surround the AGN. In particular, if there are nearby states in the dark sector which can appear resonantly in the scattering, the cross section can be enhanced and a distinctive edge feature in the energy spectrum may appear. We examine bounds on supersymmetric models which may be obtained from the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope observation of the nearby AGN Centaurus A.
