Sensitivity of the Cherenkov Telescope Array to a dark matter signal from the Galactic centre

Full list of authors: Acharyya, A.; Adam, R.; Adams, C.; Agudo, I.; Aguirre-Santaella, A.; Alfaro, R.; Alfaro, J.; Alispach, C.; Aloisio, R.; Alves Batista, R.; Amati, L.; Ambrosi, G.; Angüner, E. O.; Antonelli, L. A.; Aramo, C.; Araudo, A.; Armstrong, T.; Arqueros, F.; Asano, K.; Ascasíbar, Y. Ashley, M.; Balazs, C.; Ballester, O.; Baquero Larriva, A.; Barbosa Martins, V.; Barkov, M.; Barres de Almeida, U.; Barrio, J. A.; Bastieri, D.; Becerra, J.; Beck, G.; Becker Tjus, J.; Benbow, W.; Benito, M.; Berge, D.; Bernardini, E.; Bernlöhr, K.; Berti, A.; Bertucci, B.; Beshley, V.; Biasuzzi, B.; Biland, A.; Bissaldi, E.; Biteau, J.; Blanch, O.; Blazek, J.; Bocchino, F.; Boisson, C.; Bonneau Arbeletche, L.; Bordas, P.; Bosnjak, Z.; Bottacini, E.; Bozhilov, V.; Bregeon, J.; Brill, A.; Bringmann, T.; Brown, A. M.; Brun, P.; Brun, F.; Bruno, P.; Bulgarelli, A.; Burton, M.; Burtovoi, A.; Buscemi, M.; Cameron, R.; Capasso, M.; Caproni, A.; Capuzzo-Dolcetta, R.; Caraveo, P.; Carosi, R.; Carosi, A.; Casanova, S.; Cascone, E.; Cassol, F.; Catalani, F.; Cauz, D.; Cerruti, M.; Chadwick, P.; Chaty, S.; Chen, A.; Chernyakova, M.; Chiaro, G.; Chiavassa, A.; Chikawa, M.; Chudoba, J.; Çolak, M.; Conforti, V.; Coniglione, R.; Conte, F.; Contreras, J. L.; Coronado-Blazquez, J.; Costa, A.; Costantini, H.; Cotter, G.; Cristofari, P.; D'Aimath, A.; D'Ammando, F.; Damone, L. A.; Daniel, M. K.; Dazzi, F.; De Angelis, A.; De Caprio, V.; de Cássia dos Anjos, R.; de Gouveia Dal Pino, E. M.; De Lotto, B.; De Martino, D.; de Oña Wilhelmi, E.; De Palma, F.; de Souza, V.; Delgado, C.; Delgado Giler, A. G.; della Volpe, D.; Depaoli, D.; Di Girolamo, T.; Di Pierro, F.; Di Venere, L.; Diebold, S.; Dmytriiev, A.; Domínguez, A.; Donini, A.; Doro, M.; Ebr, J.; Eckner, C.; Edwards, T. D. P.; Ekoume, T. R. N.; Elsässer, D.; Evoli, C.; Falceta-Goncalves, D.; Fedorova, E.; Fegan, S.; Feng, Q.; Ferrand, G.; Ferrara, G.; Fiandrini, E.; Fiasson, A.; Filipovic, M.; Fioretti, V.; Fiori, M.; Foffano, L.; Fontaine, G.; Fornieri, O.; Franco, F. J.; Fukami, S.; Fukui, Y.; Gaggero, D.; Galaz, G.; Gammaldi, V.; Garcia, E.; Garczarczyk, M.; Gascon, D.; Gent, A.; Ghalumyan, A.; Gianotti, F.; Giarrusso, M.; Giavitto, G.; Giglietto, N.; Giordano, F.; Giuliani, A.; Glicenstein, J.; Gnatyk, R.; Goldoni, P.; González, M. M.; Gourgouliatos, K.; Granot, J.; Grasso, D.; Green, J.; Grillo, A.; Gueta, O.; Gunji, S.; Halim, A.; Hassan, T.; Heller, M.; Hernández Cadena, S.; Hiroshima, N.; Hnatyk, B.; Hofmann, W.; Holder, J.; Horan, D.; Hörandel, J.; Horvath, P.; Hovatta, T.; Hrabovsky, M.; Hrupec, D.; Hughes, G.; Humensky, T. B.; Hütten, M.; Iarlori, M.; Inada, T.; Inoue, S.; Iocco, F.; Iori, M.; Jamrozy, M.; Janecek, P.; Jin, W.; Jouvin, L.; Jurysek, J.; Karukes, E.; Katarzyński, K.; Kazanas, D.; Kerszberg, D.; Kherlakian, M. C.; Kissmann, R.; Knödlseder, J.; Kobayashi, Y.; Kohri, K.; Komin, N.; Kubo, H.; Kushida, J.; Lamanna, G.; Lapington, J.; Laporte, P.; Leigui de Oliveira, M. A.; Lenain, J.; Leone, F.; Leto, G.; Lindfors, E.; Lohse, T.; Lombardi, S.; Longo, F.; Lopez, A.; López, M.; López-Coto, R.; Loporchio, S.; Luque-Escamilla, P. L.; Mach, E.; Maggio, C.; Maier, G.; Mallamaci, M.; Malta Nunes de Almeida, R.; Mandat, D.; Manganaro, M.; Mangano, S.; Manicò, G.; Marculewicz, M.; Mariotti, M.; Markoff, S.; Marquez, P.; Martí, J.; Martinez, O.; Martínez, M.; Martínez, G.; Martínez-Huerta, H.; Maurin, G.; Mazin, D.; Mbarubucyeye, J. D.; Medina Miranda, D.; Meyer, M.; Miceli, M.; Miener, T.; Minev, M.; Miranda, J. M.; Mirzoyan, R.; Mizuno, T.; Mode, B.; Moderski, R.; Mohrmann, L.; Molina, E.; Montaruli, T.; Moralejo, A.; Morcuende-Parrilla, D.; Morselli, A.; Mukherjee, R.; Mundell, C.; Nagai, A.; Nakamori, T.; Nemmen, R.; Niemiec, J.; Nieto, D.; Nikołajuk, M.; Ninci, D.; Noda, K.; Nosek, D.; Nozaki, S.; Ohira, Y.; Ohishi, M.; Ohtani, Y.; Oka, T.; Okumura, A.; Ong, R. A.; Orienti, M.; Orito, R.; Orlandini, M.; Orlando, S.; Orlando, E.; Ostrowski, M.; Oya, I.; Pagano, I.; Pagliaro, A.; Palatiello, M.; Pantaleo, F. R.; Paredes, J. M.; Pareschi, G.; Parmiggiani, N.; Patricelli, B.; Pavletić, L.; Pe'er, A.; Pecimotika, M.; Pérez-Romero, J.; Persic, M.; Petruk, O.; Pfrang, K.; Piano, G.; Piatteli, P.; Pietropaolo, E.; Pillera, R.; Pilszyk, B.; Pintore, F.; Pohl, M.; Poireau, V.; Prado, R. R.; Prandini, E.; Prast, J.; Principe, G.; Prokoph, H.; Prouza, M.; Przybilski, H.; Pühlhofer, G.; Pumo, M. L.; Queiroz, F.; Quirrenbach, A.; Rainò, S.; Rando, R.; Razzaque, S.; Recchia, S.; Reimer, O.; Reisenegger, A.; Renier, Y.; Rhode, W.; Ribeiro, D.; Ribó, M.; Richtler, T.; Rico, J.; Rieger, F.; Rinchiuso, L.; Rizi, V.; Rodriguez, J.; Rodriguez Fernandez, G.; Rodriguez Ramirez, J. C.; Rojas, G.; Romano, P.; Romeo, G.; Rosado, J.; Rowell, G.; Rudak, B.; Russo, F.; Sadeh, I.; Sæther Hatlen, E.; Safi-Harb, S.; Salesa Greus, F.; Salina, G.; Sanchez, D.; Sánchez-Conde, M.; Sangiorgi, P.; Sano, H.; Santander, M.; Santos, E. M.; Santos-Lima, R.; Sanuy, A.; Sarkar, S.; Saturni, F. G.; Sawangwit, U.; Schussler, F.; Schwanke, U.; Sciacca, E.; Scuderi, S.; Seglar-Arroyo, M.; Sergijenko, O.; Servillat, M.; Seweryn, K.; Shalchi, A.; Sharma, P.; Shellard, R. C.; Siejkowski, H.; Silk, J.; Siqueira, C.; Sliusar, V.; Słowikowska, A.; Sokolenko, A.; Sol, H.; Spencer, S.; Stamerra, A.; Stanič, S.; Starling, R.; Stolarczyk, T.; Straumann, U.; Strišković, J.; Suda, Y.; Suomijarvi, T.; Świerk, P.; Tavecchio, F.; Taylor, L.; Tejedor, L. A.; Teshima, M.; Testa, V.; Tibaldo, L.; Todero Peixoto, C. J.; Tokanai, F.; Tonev, D.; Tosti, G.; Tosti, L.; Tothill, N.; Truzzi, S.; Travnicek, P.; Vagelli, V.; Vallage, B.; Vallania, P.; van Eldik, C.; Vandenbroucke, J.; Varner, G. S.; Vassiliev, V.; Vázquez Acosta, M.; Vecchi, M.; Ventura, S.; Vercellone, S.; Vergani, S.; Verna, G.; Viana, A.; Vigorito, C. F.; Vink, J.; Vitale, V.; Vorobiov, S.; Vovk, I.; Vuillaume, T.; Wagner, S. J.; Walter, R.; Watson, J.; Weniger, C.; White, R.; White, M.; Wiemann, R.; Wierzcholska, A.; Will, M.; Williams, D. A.; Wischnewski, R.; Yanagita, S.; Yang, L.; Yoshikoshi, T.; Zacharias, M.; Zaharijas, G.; Zakaria, A. A.; Zampieri, L.; Zanin, R.; Zaric, D.; Zavrtanik, M.; Zavrtanik, D.; Zdziarski, A. A.; Zech, A.; Zechlin, H.; Zhdanov, V. I.; Živec, M.-- This is an open access article published by IOP Publishing Ltd on behalf of Sissa Medialab. Original content from this work may be used under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 licence. Any further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the title of the work, journal citation and DOI.We provide an updated assessment of the power of the Cherenkov Telescope Array (CTA) to search for thermally produced dark matter at the TeV scale, via the associated gamma-ray signal from pair-annihilating dark matter particles in the region around the Galactic centre. We find that CTA will open a new window of discovery potential, significantly extending the range of robustly testable models given a standard cuspy profile of the dark matter density distribution. Importantly, even for a cored profile, the projected sensitivity of CTA will be sufficient to probe various well-motivated models of thermally produced dark matter at the TeV scale. This is due to CTA's unprecedented sensitivity, angular and energy resolutions, and the planned observational strategy. The survey of the inner Galaxy will cover a much larger region than corresponding previous observational campaigns with imaging atmospheric Cherenkov telescopes. CTA will map with unprecedented precision the large-scale diffuse emission in high-energy gamma rays, constituting a background for dark matter searches for which we adopt state-of-the-art models based on current data. Throughout our analysis, we use up-to-date event reconstruction Monte Carlo tools developed by the CTA consortium, and pay special attention to quantifying the level of instrumental systematic uncertainties, as well as background template systematic errors, required to probe thermally produced dark matter at these energies. © 2021 The Author(s).We gratefully acknowledge financial support from the following agencies and organisations: State Committee of Science of Armenia, Armenia; The Australian Research Council, Astronomy Australia Ltd, The University of Adelaide, Australian National University, Monash University, The University of New South Wales, The University of Sydney, Western Sydney University, Australia; Federal Ministry of Education, Science and Research, and Innsbruck University, Austria; Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Cientifico e Tecnologico (CNPq), Fundacao de Amparo a Pesquisa do Estado do Rio de Janeiro (FAPERJ), Fundacao de Amparo a Pesquisa do Estado de Sao Paulo (FAPESP), Ministry of Science, Technology, Innovations and Communications (MCTIC), and Instituto Serrapilheira, Brasil; Ministry of Education and Science, National RI Roadmap Project DO1-153/28.08.2018, Bulgaria; The Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada and the Canadian Space Agency, Canada; CONICYT-Chile grants CATA AFB 170002, ANID PIA/APOYO AFB 180002, ACT 1406, FONDECYT-Chile grants, 1161463, 1170171, 1190886, 1171421, 1170345, 1201582, Gemini-ANID 32180007, Chile; Croatian Science Foundation, Rudjer Boskovic Institute, University of Osijek, University of Rijeka, University of Split, Faculty of Electrical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering and Naval Architecture, University of Zagreb, Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computing, Croatia; Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports, MEYS LM2015046, LM2018105, LTT17006, EU/MEYS CZ.02.1.01/0.0/0.0/16_013/0001403, CZ.02.1.01/0.0/0.0/18_046/0016007 and CZ.02.1.01/0.0/0.0/16_019/0000754, Czech Republic; Academy of Finland (grant nr.317636, 320045, 317383 and 320085), Finland; Ministry of Higher Education and Research, CNRS-INSU and CNRS-IN2P3, CEA-Irfu, ANR, Regional Council Ile de France, Labex ENIGMASS, OSUG2020, P2IO and OCEVU, France; Max Planck Society, BMBF, DESY, Helmholtz Association, Germany; Department of Atomic Energy, Department of Science and Technology, India; Istituto Nazionale di Astrofisica (INAF), Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare (INFN), MIUR, Istituto Nazionale di Astrofisica (INAF-OABRERA) Grant Fondazione Cariplo/Regione Lombardia ID 2014-1980/RST_ERC, Italy; ICRR, University of Tokyo, JSPS, MEXT, Japan; Netherlands Research School for Astronomy (NOVA), Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO), Netherlands; University of Oslo, Norway; Ministry of Science and Higher Education, DIR/WK/2017/12, the National Centre for Research and Development and the National Science Centre, UMO-2016/22/M/ST9/00583, Poland; Slovenian Research Agency, grants P1-0031, P1-0385, I0-0033, J1-9146, J1-1700, N1-0111, and the Young Researcher program, Slovenia; South African Department of Science and Technology and National Research Foundation through the South African Gamma-Ray Astronomy Programme, South Africa; The Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation and the Spanish Research State Agency (AEI) through grants AYA2016-79724-C4-1-P, AYA2016-80889-P, AYA2016-76012-C3-1-P, BES-2016-076342, ESP2017-87055-C2-1-P, FPA2017-82729-C6-1-R, FPA2017-82729-C6-2-R, FPA2017-82729-C6-3-R, FPA2017-82729-C6-4-R, FPA2017-82729-C6-5-R, FPA2017-82729-C6-6-R, PGC2018-095161-B-I00, PGC2018-095512-B-I00; the \Centro de Excelencia Severo Ochoa"program through grants no. SEV-2015-0548, SEV-2016-0597, SEV-2016-0588, SEV-2017-0709; the "Unidad de Excelencia Maria de Maeztu" program through grant no. MDM-2015-0509; the "Ramon y Cajal" programme through grants RYC-2013-14511, RyC-2013-14660, RYC-2017-22665; and the MultiDark Consolider Network FPA2017-90566-REDC. Atraccion de Talento contract no. 2016-T1/TIC-1542 granted by the Comunidad de Madrid; the "Postdoctoral Junior Leader Fellowship" programme from La Caixa Banking Foundation, grants no. LCF/BQ/LI18/11630014 and LCF/BQ/PI18/11630012; the "Programa Operativo" FEDER2014-2020, Consejeria de Economia y Conocimiento de la Junta de Andalucia (ref. 1257737), PAIDI 2020 (ref. P18-FR-1580), and Universidad de Jaen; the Spanish AEI EQC2018-005094-P FEDER 2014-2020; the European Union's "Horizon 2020" research and innovation programme under Marie Sklodowska-Curie grant agreement no. 665919; and the ESCAPE project with grant no. GA:824064, Spain; Swedish Research Council, Royal Physiographic Society of Lund, Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, The Swedish National Infrastructure for Computing (SNIC) at Lunarc (Lund), Sweden; State Secretariat for Education, Research and Innovation (SERI) and Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF), Switzerland; Durham University, Leverhulme Trust, Liverpool University, University of Leicester, University of Oxford, Royal Society, Science and Technology Facilities Council, U.K.; U.S. National Science Foundation, U.S. Department of Energy, Argonne National Laboratory, Barnard College, University of California, University of Chicago, Columbia University, Georgia Institute of Technology, Institute for Nuclear and Particle Astrophysics (INPAC-MRPI program), Iowa State University, the Smithsonian Institution, Washington University McDonnell Center for the Space Sciences, The University of Wisconsin and the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation, U.S.A. The research leading to these results has received funding from the European Union's Seventh Framework Programme (FP7/2007-2013) under grant agreements No 262053 and No 317446. This project is receiving funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programs under agreement No 676134.Peer reviewe

Galactic Gamma-Ray Diffuse Emission at TeV energies with HAWC Data

The Galactic gamma-ray diffuse emission (GDE) is emitted by cosmic rays (CRs), ultra-relativistic protons and electrons, interacting with gas and electromagnetic radiation fields in the interstellar medium. Here we present the analysis of TeV diffuse emission from a region of the Galactic Plane over the range in longitude of $l\in[43^\circ,73^\circ]$, using data collected with the High Altitude Water Cherenkov (HAWC) detector. Spectral, longitudinal and latitudinal distributions of the TeV diffuse emission are shown. The radiation spectrum is compatible with the spectrum of the emission arising from a CR population with an "index" similar to that of the observed CRs. When comparing with the \texttt{DRAGON} \textit{base model}, the HAWC GDE flux is higher by about a factor of two. Unresolved sources such as pulsar wind nebulae and TeV halos could explain the excess emission. Finally, deviations of the Galactic CR flux from the locally measured CR flux may additionally explain the difference between the predicted and measured diffuse fluxes

Sensitivity of the Cherenkov Telescope Array to a dark matter signal from the Galactic centre

We provide an updated assessment of the power of the Cherenkov Telescope Array (CTA) to search for thermally produced dark matter at the TeV scale, via the associated gamma-ray signal from pair-annihilating dark matter particles in the region around the Galactic centre. We find that CTA will open a new window of discovery potential, significantly extending the range of robustly testable models given a standard cuspy profile of the dark matter density distribution. Importantly, even for a cored profile, the projected sensitivity of CTA will be sufficient to probe various well-motivated models of thermally produced dark matter at the TeV scale. This is due to CTA's unprecedented sensitivity, angular and energy resolutions, and the planned observational strategy. The survey of the inner Galaxy will cover a much larger region than corresponding previous observational campaigns with imaging atmospheric Cherenkov telescopes. CTA will map with unprecedented precision the large-scale diffuse emission in high-energy gamma rays, constituting a background for dark matter searches for which we adopt state-of-the-art models based on current data. Throughout our analysis, we use up-to-date event reconstruction Monte Carlo tools developed by the CTA consortium, and pay special attention to quantifying the level of instrumental systematic uncertainties, as well as background template systematic errors, required to probe thermally produced dark matter at these energies

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