Detecting asymmetric dark matter in the Sun with neutrinos

Kohta Murase, Ian M. Shoemaker

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

16 Scopus citations

Abstract

Dark matter (DM) may have a relic density that is in part determined by a particle/antiparticle asymmetry, much like baryons. If this is the case, it can accumulate in stars like the Sun to sizable number densities and annihilate to Standard Model particles including neutrinos. We show that the combination of neutrino telescope and direct detection data can be used in conjunction to determine or constrain the DM asymmetry from data. Depending on the DM mass, the current neutrino data from Super-Kamiokande and IceCube give powerful constraints on asymmetric DM unless its fractional asymmetry is 10-2. Future neutrino telescopes and detectors like Hyper-K and KM3NeT can search for the resulting signal of high-energy neutrinos from the center of the Sun. The observation of such a flux yields information on both the DM-nucleus cross section and also on the relative abundances of DM and anti-DM.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Article number063512
JournalPhysical Review D
Volume94
Issue number6
DOIs
StatePublished - Sep 12 2016

All Science Journal Classification (ASJC) codes

  • Physics and Astronomy (miscellaneous)

Cite this