Related papers: Relaxing constraints on dark matter annihilation
The lack of evidence for low energy supersymmetry at the LHC implies a supersymmetry scale in excess a TeV. While this is consistent (and even helpful) with a Higgs boson mass at $\approx$ 125 GeV, simple supersymmetric models with scalar…
Dark matter is a vital component of the current best model of our universe, $\Lambda$CDM. There are leading candidates for what the dark matter could be (e.g. weakly-interacting massive particles, or axions), but no compelling observational…
Coupling dark matter to light new particles is an attractive way to combine thermal production with strong velocity-dependent self-interactions. Here we point out that in such models the dark matter annihilation rate is generically enhanced…
The freeze-out of dark matter (DM) depends on the evolution of the DM temperature. The DM temperature does not have to follow the standard model one, when the elastic scattering is not sufficient to maintain the kinetic equilibrium. We…
The thermal history of the universe before the epoch of nucleosynthesis is unknown. The maximum temperature in the radiation-dominated era, which we will refer to as the reheat temperature, may have been as low as 0.7 MeV. In this paper we…
The tentative 1.4 TeV excess in the $e^+e^-$ spectrum measured by The DArk Matter Particle Explorer (DAMPE) motivates the possible existence of one or more local dark matter concentrated regions. In particular, Ultra-compact Micro Halos…
Earth-mass ``microhalos'' may be the first objects to virialize in the early universe. Their ability to survive the hierarchical clustering process as substructure in the larger halos that form subsequently has implications for dark matter…
A mechanism is identified whereby dark matter (DM) in protostellar halos dramatically alters the current theoretical framework for the formation of the first stars. Heat from neutralino DM annihilation is shown to overwhelm any cooling…
Hints of direct dark matter detection coming from the DAMA, CoGeNT experiments point toward light dark matter with isospin-violating and possibly inelastic couplings. However an array of astrophysical constraints are rapidly closing the…
Neutrinos heavier than $M_Z/2\sim 45$ GeV are not excluded by particle physics data. Stable neutrinos heavier than this might contribute to the cosmic gamma ray background through annihilation in distant galaxies as well as to the dark…
Caustics are a generic feature of the nonlinear growth of structure in the dark matter distribution. If the dark matter were absolutely cold, its mass density would diverge at caustics, and the integrated annihilation probability would also…
We propose that dark matter is composed of particles that naturally have the correct thermal relic density, but have neither weak-scale masses nor weak interactions. These WIMPless models emerge naturally from gauge-mediated supersymmetry…
Primordial stars formed in the early universe are thought to be hosted by compact dark matter (DM) halos. If DM consists of Weakly Interacting Massive Particles (WIMPs), such stars may be powered by DM annihilation during the early phases…
Previous attempts at explaining the gamma-ray excess near the Galactic Centre have focussed on dark matter annihilation directly into Standard Model particles. This results in a preferred dark matter mass of 30-40 GeV (if the annihilation…
Dark matter particles may be captured by a star and then thermalized in the star's core. At the end of its life a massive star collapses suddenly and a compact object is formed. The dark matter particles redistribute accordingly. In the…
Thermal relic dark matter below $\sim 10 \ \text{GeV}$ is excluded by cosmic microwave background data if its annihilation to visible particles is unsuppressed near the epoch of recombination. Usual model-building measures to avoid this…
We derive constraints on mixed dark-matter scenarios consisting of primordial black holes (PBHs) and weakly interacting massive particles (WIMPs). In these scenarios, we expect a density spike of the WIMPs that are gravitationally bound to…
In a close encounter with a neutron star, a primordial black hole can get gravitationally captured by depositing a considerable amount of energy into nonradial stellar modes of very high angular number $l$. If the neutron-star equation of…
Dark matter (DM) annihilations have been widely studied as a possible explanation of excess gamma rays from the galactic center seen by Fermi/LAT. However most such models are in conflict with constraints from dwarf spheroidals. Motivated…
There are many reasons to believe the present mass density of the universe is dominated by a weakly interacting massive particle (WIMP), a fossil relic of the early universe. Theoretical ideas and experimental efforts have focused mostly on…