Related papers: Heavy Thermal Relics from Zombie Collisions
In this letter, we consider a class of scenarios in which the dark matter is part of a heavy hidden sector that is thermally decoupled from the Standard Model in the early universe. The dark matter freezes-out by annihilating to a lighter,…
When dark matter particles only feebly interact with plasma constituents in the early universe, they never reach thermal equilibrium. As opposed to the freeze-out mechanism, where the dark matter abundance is determined at $T \ll M$, the…
We propose an alternate, calculable mechanism of dark matter genesis, "thermal freeze-in," involving a Feebly Interacting Massive Particle (FIMP) interacting so feebly with the thermal bath that it never attains thermal equilibrium. As with…
We show that the relic abundance of thermal dark matter annihilating via a long-range interaction, is significantly affected by the formation and decay of dark matter bound states in the early universe, if the dark matter mass is above a…
We propose a novel scenario to obtain the correct relic abundance for thermally under-produced dark matter. This scenario utilizes a strongly first-order phase transition at temperature $T_{\rm PT}$ that gives rise to dark matter mass $m$.…
Using the upper bound on the inelastic reaction cross-section implied by S-matrix unitarity, we derive the thermally averaged maximum dark matter (DM) annihilation rate for general $k \rightarrow 2$ number-changing reactions, with $k \geq…
The 'WIMP miracle' for the relic abundance of thermal dark matter motivates weak scale dark matter with renormalizable couplings to standard model particles. We study minimal models with such couplings that explain dark matter as a thermal…
It is quite plausible that the mass of the dark matter particle increases significantly after its freeze-out, due to a scalar field rolling to large values. We describe a realization of this scenario in the context of thermal inflation…
We explore the production of thermal dark matter (DM) candidates (WIMPs, SIMPs, ELDERs and Cannibals) during cosmic reheating. Assuming a general parametrization for the scaling of the inflaton energy density and the standard model (SM)…
In this paper, we calculate the relic abundance of the dark matter particles when they can annihilate into sterile neutrinos with the mass $\lesssim 100 \text{ GeV}$ in a simple model. Unlike the usual standard calculations, the sterile…
There are many extensions of the Standard Model with a dark matter (DM) candidate obtained via the freeze-out mechanism. It can happen that after all experimental and theoretical constraints are taken into account, all parameter points have…
The lack of new physics at the LHC so far weakens the argument for TeV scale thermal dark matter. On the other hand, heavier, non-thermal dark matter is generally difficult to test experimentally. Here we consider the interesting and…
We investigate the thermal relics as hot, warm and cold dark matter in $\mathscr{L}=\varepsilon^{2-2\beta}R^\beta+{16\pi}m_{\text{Pl}}^{-2}\mathscr{L}_m$ gravity, where $\varepsilon$ is a constant balancing the dimension of the field…
Dark Matter particles with inelastic interactions are ubiquitous in extensions of the Standard Model, yet remain challenging to fully probe with existing strategies. We propose a series of powerful searches at hadron and lepton colliders…
We study a nonstandard dark-matter thermal history in which strong self-interactions give rise to collective many-body effects at high number density, as in strongly interacting quantum media. At early times, dark matter occupies a…
Conversion-driven freeze-out is an appealing mechanism to explain the observed relic density while naturally accommodating the null-results from direct and indirect detection due to a very weak dark matter coupling. Interestingly, the…
Dark matter (DM) as a thermal relic of the primordial plasma is increasingly pressured by direct and indirect searches, while the same production mechanism in a decoupled sector is much less constrained. We extend the standard treatment of…
The identity of dark matter is being sought with increasingly sensitive and voluminous underground detectors. Recently the XENON1T collaboration reported excess electronic recoil events, with most of these having recoil energies around…
We consider thermal production mechanisms of self-interacting dark matter in models with gauged $Z_3$ symmetry. A complex scalar dark matter is stabilized by the $Z_3$, that is the remnant of a local dark $U(1)_d$. Light dark matter with…
Dark matter produced from thermal freeze-out is typically restricted to have masses above roughly 1 MeV. However, if the couplings are small, the freeze-in mechanism allows for production of dark matter down to keV masses. We consider dark…