Thermal dark matter via the flavon portal

Dark matter (DM) is added to the Froggatt-Nielsen (FN) mechanism, and conditions for its successful freezeout identified. Requesting the FN scale $\Lambda_{\text{FN}}$ to be the cutoff of the theory renders freezeout scenarios surprisingly few. Fermionic DM is typically charged under $U(1)_{\text{FN}}$, with the dominant annihilation channel a CP-even flavon + CP-odd flavon. A minimal case is when the DM-flavon coupling strength is $\mathcal{O}(1)$, with several implications: (1) the DM mass is $\mathcal{O}$(100 GeV - 1 TeV), thanks to the WIMP coincidence, (2) requiring perturbativity of couplings puts a lower $and$ upper limit on the flavor scale, 2 TeV $\lesssim \Lambda_{\text{FN}} \lesssim 14~$TeV, on account of its relation to DM mass and couplings, (3) DM is a "secluded WIMP" effectively hidden from collider and direct detection searches. Limits on the masses of dark matter and mediators from kaon mixing measurements constitute the best constraints, surpassing Xenon1T, Fermi-LAT, and the LHC. Future direct detection searches, and collider searches for missing energy plus a single jet/bottom/top, are promising avenues for discovery.