Constraints on dark matter annihilation from a nearby subhalo candidate

Fuente: arXiv
Salvato in:
Dettagli Bibliografici
Autori principali: Zhu, Ben-Yang, Liang, Yun-Feng, Huang, Xiaoyuan
Natura: Preprint
Pubblicazione: 2025
Soggetti:
Accesso online:
Tags: Aggiungi Tag
Nessun Tag, puoi essere il primo ad aggiungerne!!
_version_ 1866909963054481408
author Zhu, Ben-Yang
Liang, Yun-Feng
Huang, Xiaoyuan
author_facet Zhu, Ben-Yang
Liang, Yun-Feng
Huang, Xiaoyuan
contents A recent analysis of pulsar timing data has reported evidence for a massive ($\sim 6 \times 10^7 M_{\odot}$) dark matter subhalo located only $\sim 0.8$ kpc from Earth. This candidate implies an exceptionally large $J$-factor of $\sim 10^{23}\,{\rm GeV^2\,cm^{-5}}$, exceeding that of known classical dwarf spheroidal galaxies by orders of magnitude and rivaling the Galactic Center. In this work, we utilize more than 17 years of $\textit{Fermi}$-LAT data to search for gamma-ray emission from this subhalo. We identify a tentative excess in the region with ambiguous origin. Adopting a conservative strategy, we retain this excess without modeling additional astrophysical components, treating it instead as unmodeled background to derive upper limits on the dark matter annihilation cross-section for the $b\bar{b}$ and $τ^+τ^-$ channels. Despite this conservative treatment, the resulting limits remain stringent due to the exceptionally large $J$-factor. Subject to the dynamical confirmation of the subhalo, these constraints are potentially orders of magnitude stronger than those obtained from combined analyses of dwarf spheroidal galaxies and blind subhalo searches.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2512_13261
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Constraints on dark matter annihilation from a nearby subhalo candidate
Zhu, Ben-Yang
Liang, Yun-Feng
Huang, Xiaoyuan
High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena
High Energy Physics - Phenomenology
A recent analysis of pulsar timing data has reported evidence for a massive ($\sim 6 \times 10^7 M_{\odot}$) dark matter subhalo located only $\sim 0.8$ kpc from Earth. This candidate implies an exceptionally large $J$-factor of $\sim 10^{23}\,{\rm GeV^2\,cm^{-5}}$, exceeding that of known classical dwarf spheroidal galaxies by orders of magnitude and rivaling the Galactic Center. In this work, we utilize more than 17 years of $\textit{Fermi}$-LAT data to search for gamma-ray emission from this subhalo. We identify a tentative excess in the region with ambiguous origin. Adopting a conservative strategy, we retain this excess without modeling additional astrophysical components, treating it instead as unmodeled background to derive upper limits on the dark matter annihilation cross-section for the $b\bar{b}$ and $τ^+τ^-$ channels. Despite this conservative treatment, the resulting limits remain stringent due to the exceptionally large $J$-factor. Subject to the dynamical confirmation of the subhalo, these constraints are potentially orders of magnitude stronger than those obtained from combined analyses of dwarf spheroidal galaxies and blind subhalo searches.
title Constraints on dark matter annihilation from a nearby subhalo candidate
topic High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena
High Energy Physics - Phenomenology
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2512.13261