Probing WIMP particle physics and astrophysics with direct detection and neutrino telescope data

Kavanagh, Bardley J.; Fornasa, Mattia; Green, Anne

Abstract

With positive signals from multiple direct detection experiments, it will, in principle, be possible to measure the mass and cross sections of weakly interacting massive particle (WIMP) dark matter. Recent work has shown that, with a polynomial parametrization of the WIMP speed distribution, it is possible to make an unbiased measurement of the WIMP mass, without making any astrophysical assumptions. However, direct detection experiments are not sensitive to low-speed WIMPs and, therefore, any model-independent approach will lead to a bias in the cross section. This problem can be solved with the addition of measurements of the flux of neutrinos from the Sun. This is because the flux of neutrinos produced from the annihilation of WIMPs which have been gravitationally captured in the Sun is sensitive to low-speed WIMPs. Using mock data from next-generation direct detection experiments and from the IceCube neutrino telescope, we show that the complementary information from IceCube on low-speed WIMPs breaks the degeneracy between the cross section and the speed distribution. This allows unbiased determinations of the WIMP mass and spin-independent and spin-dependent cross sections to be made, and the speed distribution to be reconstructed. We use two parametrizations of the speed distribution: binned and polynomial. While the polynomial parametrization can encompass a wider range of speed distributions, this leads to larger uncertainties in the particle physics parameters.

Citation

Kavanagh, B. J., Fornasa, M., & Green, A. (2015). Probing WIMP particle physics and astrophysics with direct detection and neutrino telescope data. Physical Review D - Particles, Fields, Gravitation and Cosmology, 91, doi:10.1103/PhysRevD.91.103533

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: May 4, 2015
• Online Publication Date: May 26, 2015
• Publication Date: May 26, 2015
• Deposit Date: Jul 25, 2018
• Print ISSN: 1550-7998
• Publisher: American Physical Society
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 91
• Article Number: 103533
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevD.91.103533
• Public URL: http://journals.aps.org/prd/abstract/10.1103/PhysRevD.91.103533
• Publisher URL: https://journals.aps.org/prd/abstract/10.1103/PhysRevD.91.103533