31 research outputs found
New constraints for heavy axion-like particles from supernovae
We derive new constraints on the coupling of heavy pseudoscalar (axion-like)
particles to photons, based on the gamma ray flux expected from the decay of
these particles into photons. After being produced in the supernova core, these
heavy axion-like particles would escape and a fraction of them would decay into
photons before reaching the Earth. We have calculated the expected flux on
Earth of these photons from the supernovae SN 1987A and Cassiopeia A and
compared our results to data from the Fermi Large Area Telescope. This analysis
provides strong constraints on the parameter space for axion-like particles.
For a particle mass of 100 MeV, we find that the Peccei-Quinn constant, f_a,
must be greater than about 10^{15} GeV. Alternatively, for fa=10^{12} GeV, we
exclude the mass region between approximately 100 eV and 1 GeV.Comment: 14 pages, 4 figures. Version published in JCAP. Major changes in the
exposition. Added a figure. Added appendix. Minor changes in the results.
Some changes in the bibliograph
The Contribution of Fermi Gamma-Ray Pulsars to the local Flux of Cosmic-Ray Electrons and Positrons
We analyze the contribution of gamma-ray pulsars from the first Fermi-Large
Area Telescope (LAT) catalogue to the local flux of cosmic-ray electrons and
positrons (e+e-). We present new distance estimates for all Fermi gamma-ray
pulsars, based on the measured gamma-ray flux and pulse shape. We then estimate
the contribution of gamma-ray pulsars to the local e+e- flux, in the context of
a simple model for the pulsar e+e- emission. We find that 10 of the Fermi
pulsars potentially contribute significantly to the measured e+e- flux in the
energy range between 100 GeV and 1 TeV. Of the 10 pulsars, 2 are old EGRET
gamma-ray pulsars, 2 pulsars were discovered with radio ephemerides, and 6 were
discovered with the Fermi pulsar blind-search campaign. We argue that known
radio pulsars fall in regions of parameter space where the e+e- contribution is
predicted to be typically much smaller than from those regions where Fermi-LAT
pulsars exist. However, comparing the Fermi gamma-ray flux sensitivity to the
regions of pulsar parameter space where a significant e+e- contribution is
predicted, we find that a few known radio pulsars that have not yet been
detected by Fermi can also significantly contribute to the local e+e- flux if
(i) they are closer than 2 kpc, and if (ii) they have a characteristic age on
the order of one mega-year.Comment: 21 pages, 6 figures, accepted for publication in JCA
Cosmic rays from Leptonic Dark Matter
If dark matter possesses a lepton number, it is natural to expect the
dark-matter annihilation and/or decay mainly produces the standard model
leptons, while negligible amount of the antiproton is produced. To illustrate
such a simple idea, we consider a scenario that a right-handed sneutrino dark
matter decays into the standard model particles through tiny R-parity violating
interactions. Interestingly enough, charged leptons as well as neutrinos are
directly produced, and they can lead to a sharp peak in the predicted positron
fraction. Moreover, the decay of the right-handed sneutrino also generates
diffuse continuum gamma rays which may account for the excess observed by
EGRET, while the primary antiproton flux can be suppressed. Those predictions
on the cosmic-ray fluxes of the positrons, gamma rays and antiprotons will be
tested by the PAMELA and FGST observatories.Comment: 21 pages, 4 figures, 2 tables, updated plots including PAMELA dat
String Necklaces and Primordial Black Holes from Type IIB Strings
We consider a model of static cosmic string loops in type IIB string theory,
where the strings wrap cycles within the internal space. The strings are not
topologically stabilised, however the presence of a lifting potential traps the
windings giving rise to kinky cycloops. We find that PBH formation occurs at
early times in a small window, whilst at late times we observe the formation of
dark matter relics in the scaling regime. This is in stark contrast to previous
predictions based on field theoretic models. We also consider the PBH
contribution to the mass density of the universe, and use the experimental data
to impose bounds on the string theory parameters.Comment: 45 pages, 9 figures, LaTeX; published versio
Direct Constraints on Minimal Supersymmetry from Fermi-LAT Observations of the Dwarf Galaxy Segue 1
The dwarf galaxy Segue 1 is one of the most promising targets for the
indirect detection of dark matter. Here we examine what constraints 9 months of
Fermi-LAT gamma-ray observations of Segue 1 place upon the Constrained Minimal
Supersymmetric Standard Model (CMSSM), with the lightest neutralino as the dark
matter particle. We use nested sampling to explore the CMSSM parameter space,
simultaneously fitting other relevant constraints from accelerator bounds, the
relic density, electroweak precision observables, the anomalous magnetic moment
of the muon and B-physics. We include spectral and spatial fits to the Fermi
observations, a full treatment of the instrumental response and its related
uncertainty, and detailed background models. We also perform an extrapolation
to 5 years of observations, assuming no signal is observed from Segue 1 in that
time. Results marginally disfavour models with low neutralino masses and high
annihilation cross-sections. Virtually all of these models are however already
disfavoured by existing experimental or relic density constraints.Comment: 22 pages, 5 figures; added extra scans with extreme halo parameters,
expanded introduction and discussion in response to referee's comment
Implications of Compressed Supersymmetry for Collider and Dark Matter Searches
Martin has proposed a scenario dubbed ``compressed supersymmetry'' (SUSY)
where the MSSM is the effective field theory between energy scales M_{\rm weak}
and M_{\rm GUT}, but with the GUT scale SU(3) gaugino mass M_3<< M_1 or M_2. As
a result, squark and gluino masses are suppressed relative to slepton, chargino
and neutralino masses, leading to a compressed sparticle mass spectrum, and
where the dark matter relic density in the early universe may be dominantly
governed by neutralino annihilation into ttbar pairs via exchange of a light
top squark. We explore the dark matter and collider signals expected from
compressed SUSY for two distinct model lines with differing assumptions about
GUT scale gaugino mass parameters. For dark matter signals, the compressed
squark spectrum leads to an enhancement in direct detection rates compared to
models with unified gaugino masses. Meanwhile, neutralino halo annihilation
rates to gamma rays and anti-matter are also enhanced relative to related
scenarios with unified gaugino masses but, depending on the halo dark matter
distribution, may yet be below the sensitivity of indirect searches underway.
In the case of collider signals, we compare the rates for the potentially
dominant decay modes of the stop_1 which may be expected to be produced in
cascade decay chains at the LHC: \tst_1\to c\tz_1 and \tst_1\to bW\tz_1. We
examine the extent to which multilepton signal rates are reduced when the
two-body decay mode dominates. For the model lines that we examine here, the
multi-lepton signals, though reduced, still remain observable at the LHC.Comment: 22 pages including 24 eps figure
Galactic-Centre Gamma Rays in CMSSM Dark Matter Scenarios
We study the production of gamma rays via LSP annihilations in the core of
the Galaxy as a possible experimental signature of the constrained minimal
supersymmetric extension of the Standard Model (CMSSM), in which
supersymmetry-breaking parameters are assumed to be universal at the GUT scale,
assuming also that the LSP is the lightest neutralino chi. The part of the
CMSSM parameter space that is compatible with the measured astrophysical
density of cold dark matter is known to include a stau_1 - chi coannihilation
strip, a focus-point strip where chi has an enhanced Higgsino component, and a
funnel at large tanb where the annihilation rate is enhanced by the poles of
nearby heavy MSSM Higgs bosons, A/H. We calculate the total annihilation rates,
the fractions of annihilations into different Standard Model final states and
the resulting fluxes of gamma rays for CMSSM scenarios along these strips. We
observe that typical annihilation rates are much smaller in the coannihilation
strip for tanb = 10 than along the focus-point strip or for tanb = 55, and that
the annihilation branching ratios differ greatly between the different dark
matter strips. Whereas the current Fermi-LAT data are not sensitive to any of
the CMSSM scenarios studied, and the calculated gamma-ray fluxes are probably
unobservably low along the coannihilation strip for tanb = 10, we find that
substantial portions of the focus-point strips and rapid-annihilation funnel
regions could be pressured by several more years of Fermi-LAT data, if
understanding of the astrophysical background and/or systematic uncertainties
can be improved in parallel.Comment: 33 pages, 12 figures, comments and references added, version to
appear in JCA
A New Approach to Searching for Dark Matter Signals in Fermi-LAT Gamma Rays
Several cosmic ray experiments have measured excesses in electrons and
positrons, relative to standard backgrounds, for energies from ~ 10 GeV - 1
TeV. These excesses could be due to new astrophysical sources, but an
explanation in which the electrons and positrons are dark matter annihilation
or decay products is also consistent. Fortunately, the Fermi-LAT diffuse gamma
ray measurements can further test these models, since the electrons and
positrons produce gamma rays in their interactions in the interstellar medium.
Although the dark matter gamma ray signal consistent with the local electron
and positron measurements should be quite large, as we review, there are
substantial uncertainties in the modeling of diffuse backgrounds and,
additionally, experimental uncertainties that make it difficult to claim a dark
matter discovery. In this paper, we introduce an alternative method for
understanding the diffuse gamma ray spectrum in which we take the intensity
ratio in each energy bin of two different regions of the sky, thereby canceling
common systematic uncertainties. For many spectra, this ratio fits well to a
power law with a single break in energy. The two measured exponent indices are
a robust discriminant between candidate models, and we demonstrate that dark
matter annihilation scenarios can predict index values that require "extreme"
parameters for background-only explanations.Comment: v1: 11 pages, 7 figures, 1 table, revtex4; v2: 13 pages, 8 figures, 1
table, revtex4, Figure 4 added, minor additions made to text, references
added, conclusions unchanged, published versio
Constraining Very Heavy Dark Matter Using Diffuse Backgrounds of Neutrinos and Cascaded Gamma Rays
We consider multi-messenger constraints on very heavy dark matter (VHDM) from
recent Fermi gamma-ray and IceCube neutrino observations of isotropic
background radiation. Fermi data on the diffuse gamma-ray background (DGB)
shows a possible unexplained feature at very high energies (VHE), which we have
called the "VHE Excess" relative to expectations for an attenuated power law
extrapolated from lower energies. We show that VHDM could explain this excess,
and that neutrino observations will be an important tool for testing this
scenario. More conservatively, we derive new constraints on the properties of
VHDM for masses of 10^3-10^10 GeV. These generic bounds follow from cosmic
energy budget constraints for gamma rays and neutrinos that we developed
elsewhere, based on detailed calculations of cosmic electromagnetic cascades
and also neutrino detection rates. We show that combining both gamma-ray and
neutrino data is essential for making the constraints on VHDM properties both
strong and robust. In the lower mass range, our constraints on VHDM
annihilation and decay are comparable to other results; however, our
constraints continue to much higher masses, where they become relatively
stronger.Comment: 33 pages, 21 figures, accepted for publication in JCA
Collider and Dark Matter Phenomenology of Models with Mirage Unification
We examine supersymmetric models with mixed modulus-anomaly mediated SUSY
breaking (MM-AMSB) soft terms which get comparable contributions to SUSY
breaking from moduli-mediation and anomaly-mediation. The apparent (mirage)
unification of soft SUSY breaking terms at Q=mu_mir not associated with any
physical threshold is the hallmark of this scenario. The MM-AMSB structure of
soft terms arises in models of string compactification with fluxes, where the
addition of an anti-brane leads to an uplifting potential and a de Sitter
universe, as first constructed by Kachru {\it et al.}. The phenomenology mainly
depends on the relative strength of moduli- and anomaly-mediated SUSY breaking
contributions, and on the Higgs and matter field modular weights, which are
determined by the location of these fields in the extra dimensions. We
delineate the allowed parameter space for a low and high value of tan(beta),
for a wide range of modular weight choices. We calculate the neutralino relic
density and display the WMAP-allowed regions. We show the reach of the CERN LHC
and of the International Linear Collider. We discuss aspects of MM-AMSB models
for Tevatron, LHC and ILC searches, muon g-2 and b->s \gamma branching
fraction. We also calculate direct and indirect dark matter detection rates,
and show that almost all WMAP-allowed models should be accessible to a
ton-scale noble gas detector. Finally, we comment on the potential of colliders
to measure the mirage unification scale and modular weights in the difficult
case where mu_mir>>M_GUT.Comment: 34 pages plus 42 EPS figures; version with high resolution figures is
at http://www.hep.fsu.edu/~bae