English

Galilean Equivalence for Galactic Dark Matter

Astrophysics 2009-11-11 v2

Abstract

Satellite galaxies are tidally disrupted as they orbit the Milky Way. If dark matter (DM) experiences a stronger self-attraction than baryons, stars will preferentially gain rather than lose energy during tidal disruption leading to an enhancement in the trailing compared to the leading tidal stream. The Sgr dwarf galaxy is seen to have roughly equal streams, challenging models in which DM and baryons accelerate differently by more than 10%. Future observations and a better understanding of DM distribution should allow detection of equivalence violation at the percent level.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.astro-ph/0606566,
  title  = {Galilean Equivalence for Galactic Dark Matter},
  author = {Michael Kesden and Marc Kamionkowski},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:astro-ph/0606566},
  year   = {2009}
}

Comments

4 pages, 3 figures, final version published in PRL

R2 v1 2026-07-22T09:09:16.970Z