Dark Matter annihilation energy output and its effects on the high-z IGM

We study the case of DM self annihilation, in order to assess its importance as an energy injection mechanism, to the IGM in general, and to the medium within particular DM haloes. We consider thermal relic WIMP particles with masses of 10GeV and 1TeV and we analyse in detail the clustering properties of DM in a $\Lambda$CDM cosmology, on all hierarchy levels, from haloes and their mass function, to subhaloes and the DM density profiles within them, considering adiabatic contraction by the presence of a SMBH. We then compute the corresponding energy output, concluding that DM annihilation does not constitute an important feedback mechanism. We also calculate the effects that DM annihilation has on the IGM temperature and ionization fraction, and we find that assuming maximal energy absorption, at z ~ 10, for the case of a 1TeV WIMP, the ionization fraction could be raised to $6 \times 10^{-4}$ and the temperature to 10K, and in the case of a 10GeV WIMP, the IGM temperature could be raised to 200K and the ionization fraction to $8 \times 10^{-3}$. We conclude that DM annihilations cannot be regarded as an alternative reionization scenario. Regarding the detectability of the WIMP through the modifications to the 21 cm differential brightness temperature signal ($\delta$Tb), we conclude that a thermal relic WIMP with mass of 1TeV is not likely to be detected from the global signal alone, except perhaps at the 1-3mK level in the frequency range 30MHz < $\nu$ < 35MHz corresponding to 40 < z < 46. However, a 10GeV mass WIMP may be detectable at the 1-3mK level in the frequency range 55MHz < $\nu$ < 119MHz corresponding to 11 < z < 25, and at the 1-10mK level in the frequency range 30MHz < $\nu$ < 40MHz corresponding to 35 < z < 46.Comment: 23 pages, 12 figures, accepted for publication in MNRA

Weyl-invariant scalar-tensor gravities from purely metric theories

We describe a method to generate scalar-tensor theories with Weyl symmetry, starting from arbitrary purely metric higher derivative gravity theories. The method consists in the definition of a conformally-invariant metric $\hat{g}_{\mu \nu}$, that is a rank (0,2)-tensor constructed out of the metric tensor and the scalar field. This new object has zero conformal weight and is given by $\phi^{2/\Delta}g_{\mu \nu}$, where ($-\Delta$) is the conformal dimension of the scalar. As $g_{\mu \nu}$ has conformal dimension of 2, the resulting tensor is trivially a conformal invariant. Then, the generated scalar-tensor theory, which we call the Weyl uplift of the original purely metric theory, is obtained by replacing the metric by $\hat{g}_{\mu \nu}$ in the action that defines the original theory. This prescription allowed us to define the Weyl uplift of theories with terms of higher order in the Riemannian curvature. Furthermore, the prescription for scalar-tensor theories coming from terms that have explicit covariant derivatives in the Lagrangian is discussed. The same mechanism can also be used for the derivation of the equations of motion of the scalar-tensor theory from the original field equations in the Einstein frame. Applying this method of Weyl uplift allowed us to reproduce the known result for the conformal scalar coupling to Lovelock gravity and to derive that of Einsteinian cubic gravity. Finally, we show that the renormalization of the theory given by the conformal scalar coupling to Einstein-Anti-de Sitter gravity originates from the Weyl uplift of the original renormalized theory, which is relevant in the framework of conformal renormalization.Comment: 20 pages, typos fixed, references and equations adde

Energy functionals from Conformal Gravity

We provide a new derivation of the Hawking mass and Willmore energy functionals for asymptotically AdS spacetimes, by embedding Einstein-AdS gravity in Conformal Gravity. By construction, the evaluation of the four-dimensional Conformal Gravity action in a manifold with a conical defect produces a codimension-2 conformal invariant functional $L_{\Sigma}$. The energy functionals are then particular cases of $L_{\Sigma}$ for Einstein-AdS and pure AdS ambient spaces, respectively. The bulk action is finite for AdS asymptotics and both Hawking mass and Willmore energy are finite as well. The result suggests a generic relation between conformal invariance and renormalization, where the codimension-2 properties are inherited from the bulk gravity action.Comment: 19 pages, 1 table, 1 figure, typo in eq.(2.8) corrected from published versio

Black hole charges in dark matter haloes and the seeds of cosmic magnetic fields

We present improved estimates of the electric charge that black holes could hold when these are embedded in the ionised plasma within dark matter haloes (or galaxies) in the Universe. We have implemented the spontaneous emission of charges of opposite sign to that of the black hole via athermal Hawking evaporation, including its dependence on black hole spin, and we have estimated the equilibrium charge that arises as this charge loss is balanced by the continuous accretion of charges from the surrounding plasma. The resulting charge can be several orders of magnitude lower than previously estimated upper limits, but it can surpass the pair production limit noted by Gibbons (1974) by a margin that increases with the amplitude of the black hole spin and the density of the plasma. We also implement a calculation for the net charge and magnetic moment of dark matter haloes when the dark matter is made of primordial black holes and also for astrophysical black holes that form part of the stellar halo of galaxies. We calculate the resulting magnetic fields of $z=15$ haloes for these different cases, and show that both primordial black holes and stellar ones could provide the magnetic field that can seed the observed ones in present-day galaxies.Comment: prepared for submission to JCAP, comments welcom

Conformal Renormalization of topological black holes in AdS6_6

We present a streamlined proof that any Einstein-AdS space is a solution of the Lu, Pang and Pope conformal gravity theory in six dimensions. The reduction of conformal gravity into Einstein theory manifestly shows that the action of the latter can be written as the Einstein-Hilbert term plus the Euler topological density and an additional contribution that depends on the Laplacian of the bulk Weyl tensor squared. The prescription for obtaining this form of the action by embedding the Einstein theory into a Weyl-invariant purely metric theory, was dubbed Conformal Renormalization and its resulting action was shown to be equivalent to the one obtained by holographic renormalization. As a non-trivial application of the method, we compute the Noether-Wald charges and thermodynamic quantities for topological black hole solutions with generic transverse section in Einstein-AdS$_6$ theory.Comment: 20 page

Renormalized holographic entanglement entropy in Lovelock gravity

We study the renormalization of Entanglement Entropy in holographic CFTs dual to Lovelock gravity. It is known that the holographic EE in Lovelock gravity is given by the Jacobson-Myers (JM) functional. As usual, due to the divergent Weyl factor in the Fefferman-Graham expansion of the boundary metric for Asymptotically AdS spaces, this entropy functional is infinite. By considering the Kounterterm renormalization procedure, which utilizes extrinsic boundary counterterms in order to renormalize the on-shell Lovelock gravity action for AAdS spacetimes, we propose a new renormalization prescription for the Jacobson-Myers functional. We then explicitly show the cancellation of divergences in the EE up to next-to-leading order in the holographic radial coordinate, for the case of spherical entangling surfaces. Using this new renormalization prescription, we directly find the $C-$function candidates for odd and even dimensional CFTs dual to Lovelock gravity. Our results illustrate the notable improvement that the Kounterterm method affords over other approaches, as it is non-perturbative and does not require that the Lovelock theory has limiting Einstein behavior.Comment: 38 pages,no figures, One reference adde