515 research outputs found
Substructure Boosts to Dark Matter Annihilation from Sommerfeld Enhancement
The recently introduced Sommerfeld enhancement of the dark matter
annihilation cross section has important implications for the detection of dark
matter annihilation in subhalos in the Galactic halo. In addition to the boost
to the dark matter annihilation cross section from the high densities of these
subhalos with respect to the main halo, an additional boost caused by the
Sommerfeld enhancement results from the fact that they are kinematically colder
than the Galactic halo. If we further believe the generic prediction of CDM
that in each subhalo there is an abundance of substructure which is
approximately self-similar to that of the Galactic halo, then I show that
additional boosts coming from the density enhancements of these small
substructures and their small velocity dispersions enhance the dark matter
annihilation cross section even further. I find that very large boost factors
( to ) are obtained in a large class of models. The implications of
these boost factors for the detection of dark matter annihilation from dwarf
Spheroidal galaxies in the Galactic halo are such that, generically, they
outshine the background gamma-ray flux and are detectable by the Fermi
Gamma-ray Space Telescope.Comment: PRD in pres
Measurement of Z Decays into Lepton Pairs
We present measurements by the Mark II experiment of the ratios of the leptonic partial widths of the Z boson to the hadronic partial width. The results are Γ_(ee)/Γ_(had)=0.037_(-0.012^()+0.016),Γ_(µµ)/Γ_(had)=0.053-_(0.015)^(+0.020), and Γ_(ττ)/Γ_(had)=0.066_(-0.017)^(+0.021), in good agreement with the standard-model prediction of 0.048. From the average leptonic width result, Γ_(ll)/Γ_(had)=0.053_(-0.009)^(+0.010), we derive Γ_(had)=1.56_(-0.24)^(+0.28) GeV. We find for the vector coupling constants of the tau and muon v_τ^2=0.31±0.31_(-0.30)^(+0.43) and v_μ^2=0.05±0.30_(-0.23)^(+0.34)
Searches for New Quarks and Leptons Produced in Z-Boson Decay
We have searched for events with new-particle topologies in 390 hadronic Z decays with the Mark II detector at the SLAC Linear Collider. We place 95%-confidence-level lower limits of 40.7 GeV/c^2 for the top-quark mass, 42.0 GeV/c^2 for the mass of a fourth-generation charge - 1/3 quark, and 41.3 GeV/c^2 for the mass of an unstable Dirac neutral lepton
The Via Lactea INCITE Simulation: Galactic Dark Matter Substructure at High Resolution
It is a clear unique prediction of the cold dark matter paradigm of
cosmological structure formation that galaxies form hierarchically and are
embedded in massive, extended dark halos teeming with self-bound substructure
or "subhalos". The amount and spatial distribution of subhalos around their
host provide unique information and clues on the galaxy assembly process and
the nature of the dark matter. Here we present results from the Via Lactea
INCITE simulation, a one billion particle, one million cpu-hour simulation of
the formation and evolution of a Galactic dark matter halo and its substructure
population.Comment: 10 pages, Proceedings of the SciDAC 2008 conference, (Seattle, July
13-17, 2008
Gravitational lensing magnification without multiple imaging
Gravitational lensing can amplify the apparent brightness of distant sources.
Images that are highly magnified are often part of multiply-imaged systems, but
we consider the possibility of having large magnifications without additional
detectable images. In rare but non-negligible situations, lensing can produce a
singly highly magnified image; this phenomenon is mainly associated with
massive cluster-scale halos (>~1e13.5 Msun). Alternatively, lensing can produce
multiply-imaged systems in which the extra images are either unresolved or too
faint to be detectable. This phenomenon is dominated by galaxies and lower-mass
halos (<~1e12 Msun), and is very sensitive to the inner density profile of the
halos. Although we study the general problem, we customize our calculations to
four quasars at redshift z~6 in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS), for which
Richards et al. (2004) have ruled out the presence of extra images down to an
image splitting of 0.3" and a flux ratio of f=0.01. We predict that 9-29% of
all z~6 quasars that are magnified by a factor of mu>10 would lack detectable
extra images, with 5-10% being true singly-imaged systems. The maximum of 29%
is reached only in the unlikely event that all low-mass (<~1e10 Msun) halos
have highly concentrated (isothermal) profiles. In more realistic models where
dwarf halos have flatter (NFW) inner profiles, the maximum probability is ~10%.
We conclude that the probability that all four SDSS quasars are magnified by a
factor of 10 is <~1e-4. The only escape from this conclusion is if there are
many (>10) multiply-imaged z~6 quasars in the SDSS database that have not yet
been identified, which seems unlikely. In other words, lensing cannot explain
the brightnesses of the z~6 quasars, and models that invoke lensing to avoid
having billion-Msun black holes in the young universe are not viable.Comment: accepted in ApJ; 15 emulateapj pages; small revisions to clarify the
tex
Combining QCD Matrix Elements at Next-to-Leading Order with Parton Showers in Electroproduction
We present a method to combine next-to-leading order (NLO) matrix elements in
QCD with leading logarithmic parton showers by applying a suitably modified
version of the phase-space-slicing method. The method consists of subsuming the
NLO corrections into a scale-dependent phase-space-slicing parameter, which is
then automatically adjusted to cut out the leading order, virtual, soft and
collinear contributions in the matrix element calculation. In this way a
positive NLO weight is obtained, which can be redistributed by a parton shower
algortihm. As an example, we display the method for single-jet inclusive cross
sections at O(alpha_s) in electroproduction. We numerically compare the
modified version of the phase-space-slicing method with the standard approach
and find very good agreement on the percent level.Comment: 21 pages, 2 eps figures. Revised section 2. To appear in PR
Probing the Local Velocity Distribution of WIMP Dark Matter with Directional Detectors
We explore the ability of directional nuclear-recoil detectors to constrain
the local velocity distribution of weakly interacting massive particle (WIMP)
dark matter by performing Bayesian parameter estimation on simulated
recoil-event data sets. We discuss in detail how directional information, when
combined with measurements of the recoil-energy spectrum, helps break
degeneracies in the velocity-distribution parameters. We also consider the
possibility that velocity structures such as cold tidal streams or a dark disk
may also be present in addition to the Galactic halo. Assuming a
carbon-tetrafluoride detector with a 30-kg-yr exposure, a 50-GeV WIMP mass, and
a WIMP-nucleon spin-dependent cross-section of 0.001 pb, we show that the
properties of a cold tidal stream may be well constrained. However, measurement
of the parameters of a dark-disk component with a low lag speed of ~50 km/s may
be challenging unless energy thresholds are improved.Comment: 38 pages, 15 figure
Dependence of direct detection signals on the WIMP velocity distribution
The signals expected in WIMP direct detection experiments depend on the
ultra-local dark matter distribution. Observations probe the local density,
circular speed and escape speed, while simulations find velocity distributions
that deviate significantly from the standard Maxwellian distribution. We
calculate the energy, time and direction dependence of the event rate for a
range of velocity distributions motivated by recent observations and
simulations, and also investigate the uncertainty in the determination of WIMP
parameters. The dominant uncertainties are the systematic error in the local
circular speed and whether or not the MW has a high density dark disc. In both
cases there are substantial changes in the mean differential event rate and the
annual modulation signal, and hence exclusion limits and determinations of the
WIMP mass. The uncertainty in the shape of the halo velocity distribution is
less important, however it leads to a 5% systematic error in the WIMP mass. The
detailed direction dependence of the event rate is sensitive to the velocity
distribution. However the numbers of events required to detect anisotropy and
confirm the median recoil direction do not change substantially.Comment: 21 pages, 7 figures, v2 version to appear in JCAP, minor change
Reconciling MOND and dark matter?
Observations of galaxies suggest a one-to-one analytic relation between the
inferred gravity of dark matter at any radius and the enclosed baryonic mass, a
relation summarized by Milgrom's law of modified Newtonian dynamics (MOND).
However, present-day covariant versions of MOND usually require some additional
fields contributing to the geometry, as well as an additional hot dark matter
component to explain cluster dynamics and cosmology. Here, we envisage a
slightly more mundane explanation, suggesting that dark matter does exist but
is the source of MOND-like phenomenology in galaxies. We assume a canonical
action for dark matter, but also add an interaction term between baryonic
matter, gravity, and dark matter, such that standard matter effectively obeys
the MOND field equation in galaxies. We show that even the simplest realization
of the framework leads to a model which reproduces some phenomenological
predictions of cold dark matter (CDM) and MOND at those scales where these are
most successful. We also devise a more general form of the interaction term,
introducing the medium density as a new order parameter. This allows for new
physical effects which should be amenable to observational tests in the near
future. Hence, this very general framework, which can be furthermore related to
a generalized scalar-tensor theory, opens the way to a possible unification of
the successes of CDM and MOND at different scales.Comment: 9 page
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