Constraints on Dark Matter Interactions with Standard Model Particles from Cosmic Microwave Background Spectral Distortions

Physical Review Letters
Yacine Ali-HaïmoudMarc Kamionkowski

Abstract

We propose a new method to constrain elastic scattering between dark matter (DM) and standard model particles in the early Universe. Direct or indirect thermal coupling of nonrelativistic DM with photons leads to a heat sink for the latter. This results in spectral distortions of the cosmic microwave background (CMB), the amplitude of which can be as large as a few times the DM-to-photon-number ratio. We compute CMB spectral distortions due to DM-proton, DM-electron, and DM-photon scattering for generic energy-dependent cross sections and DM mass m_{χ}≳1 keV. Using Far-Infrared Absolute Spectrophotometer measurements, we set constraints on the cross sections for m_{χ}≲0.1 MeV. In particular, for energy-independent scattering we obtain σ_{DM-proton}≲10^{-24} cm^{2} (keV/m_{χ})^{1/2}, σ_{DM-electron}≲10^{-27} cm^{2} (keV/m_{χ})^{1/2}, and σ_{DM-photon}≲10^{-39} cm^{2} (m_{χ}/keV). An experiment with the characteristics of the Primordial Inflation Explorer would extend the regime of sensitivity up to masses m_{χ}~1 GeV.

References

Mar 17, 2011·Physical Review Letters·E BehnkeUNKNOWN COUPP Collaboration
Oct 4, 2012·Physical Review Letters·Rouven EssigTomer Volansky
Dec 12, 2012·Physical Review Letters·E AprileUNKNOWN XENON100 Collaboration

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Citations

May 31, 2019·Physical Review Letters·Yohei EmaRyosuke Sato
Sep 8, 2018·Physical Review Letters·Vera Gluscevic, Kimberly K Boddy

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