Related papers: Constraining decaying dark matter with neutron sta…
Recent theoretical work has explored dark matter accumulation in the Earth and its drift towards the center of the Earth that, for the current age of the Earth, does not necessarily result in a concentration of dark matter ($\chi$) in the…
New decay channels for the neutron into dark matter plus other particles have been suggested for explaining a long-standing discrepancy between the neutron lifetime measured from trapped neutrons versus those decaying in flight. Many such…
The discrepancies in different measurements of the lifetime of isolated neutrons could be resolved by considering an extra neutron decay channel into dark matter, with a branching ratio of the order of $O(1$\%). Although the decay channel…
Two of the most fundamental properties of the dark matter particle, the mass and the lifetime, are only weakly constrained by the astronomical and cosmological evidence of dark matter. We derive in this paper lower limits on the lifetime of…
We explore the suggestion that the neutron lifetime puzzle might be resolved by neutrons decaying into dark matter through the process, n \rightarrow \chi\chi\chi, with \chi having a mass one third of that of the neutron. In particular, we…
The cold dark matter may be in a meta-stable state and decays to other particles with a very long lifetime. If the decaying products of the dark matter are weakly interacting, e.g. neutrinos, then it would have little impact on…
We demonstrate that the observation of neutron stars with masses greater than one solar mass places severe demands on any exotic neutron decay mode that could explain the discrepancy between beam and bottle measurements of the neutron…
Comparing Big Bang Nucleosynthesis predictions with the light element abundances inferred from observational data, we can obtain the strong constraints on some neutrino properties, e.g. number of neutrino species, mass, lifetime. Recently…
We derive constraints on the relic abundance of a generic particle of mass $\sim~1-10^{14}$ TeV which decays into neutrinos at cosmological epochs, using data from the Fr\'ejus and IMB nucleon decay detectors and the Fly's Eye air shower…
We point out the following astrophysical consequences of a tau neutrino with mass in the MeV range: (i) if it has a small electric charge which will allow it to become a cold dark matter of the universe, then present limits on the 511 KeV…
As we have pointed out in (arXiv:1806.10107 [hep-ph]), the existence of neutron dark matter decay modes "n -> chi + anything", where "chi" is a dark matter fermion, for the solution of the neutron lifetime problem changes priorities and…
A recent proposal suggests that experimental discrepancies on the lifetime of neutrons can be resolved if neutrons decay to dark matter. At the same time it has been demonstrated that such a decay mode would soften the nuclear equation of…
Dark matter particles could be superheavy (mass $M_X\gtrsim10^9~$GeV) provided that their lifetime $\tau_X$ is extremely long, i.e. greater than $\simeq 10^{22}~$yr. Such stringent constraints on $\tau_X$ are generally obtained by limiting…
The best upper bounds on the masses of stable and unstable light neutrinos derive from the upper bound on the total mass density, as inferred from the lower limit $t_0> 13$ Gyr on the dynamical age of the Universe: If the Universe is…
Inspired by the well known anomaly in the life time of the neutron, we investigate its consequences inside neutron stars. We first assess the viability of the neutron decay hypothesis suggested by Fornal and Grinstein within neutrons tars,…
It is possible that the strongest interactions between dark matter and the Standard Model occur via the neutrino sector. Unlike gamma rays and charged particles, neutrinos provide a unique avenue to probe for astrophysical sources of dark…
We present a complete analysis of the cosmological constraints on decaying dark matter. Previous analyses have used the cosmic microwave background and Type Ia supernova. We have updated them with the latest data as well as extended the…
It was recently suggested that the discrepancy between two methods of measuring the lifetime of the neutron may be a result of an unseen decay mode into a dark matter particle which is almost degenerate with the neutron. We explore the…
We calculate the number of dark matter particles that a neutron star accumulates over its lifetime as it rotates around the center of a galaxy, when the dark matter particle is a self-interacting boson but does not self-annihilate. We take…
The hypothesis that neutrons might decay into dark matter is explored using neutron stars as a testing ground. It is found that in order to obtain stars with masses at the upper end of those observed, the dark matter must experience a…