Barenboim, G., Blinov, N., & Stebbins, A. (2021). Smallest remnants of early matter domination. J. Cosmol. Astropart. Phys., 12(12), 026–50pp.
Abstract: The evolution of the universe prior to Big Bang Nucleosynthesis could have gone through a phase of early matter domination which enhanced the growth of small-scale dark matter structure. If this period was long enough, self-gravitating objects formed prior to reheating. We study the evolution of these dense early halos through reheating. At the end of early matter domination, the early halos undergo rapid expansion and eventually eject their matter. We find that this process washes out structure on scales much larger than naively expected from the size of the original halos. We compute the density profiles of the early halo remnants and use them to construct late-time power spectra that include these non-linear effects. We evolve the resulting power spectrum to estimate the properties of microhalos that would form after matter-radiation equality. Surprisingly, cosmologies with a short period of early matter domination lead to an earlier onset of microhalo formation compared to those with a long period. In either case, dark matter structure formation begins much earlier than in the standard cosmology, with most dark matter bound in microhalos in the late universe.
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Sierra, D. A., De Romeri, V., Flores, L. J., & Papoulias, D. K. (2022). Impact of COHERENT measurements, cross section uncertainties and new interactions on the neutrino floor. J. Cosmol. Astropart. Phys., 01(1), 055–26pp.
Abstract: We reconsider the discovery limit of multi-ton direct detection dark matter experiments in the light of recent measurements of the coherent elastic neutrino-nucleus scattering process. Assuming the cross section to be a parameter entirely determined by data, rather than using its Standard Model prediction, we use the COHERENT CsI and LAr data sets to determine WIMP discovery limits. Being based on a data-driven approach, the results are thus free from theoretical assumptions and fall within the WIMP mass regions where XENONnT and DARWIN have best expected sensitivities. We further determine the impact of subleading nuclear form factor and weak mixing angle uncertainties effects on WIMP discovery limits. We point out that these effects, albeit small, should be taken into account. Moreover, to quantify the impact of new physics effects in the neutrino background, we revisit WIMP discovery limits assuming light vector and scalar mediators as well as neutrino magnetic moments/transitions. We stress that the presence of new interactions in the neutrino sector, in general, tend to worsen the WIMP discovery limit.
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DUNE Collaboration(Abi, B. et al), Antonova, M., Barenboim, G., Cervera-Villanueva, A., De Romeri, V., Fernandez Menendez, P., et al. (2021). Searching for solar KDAR with DUNE. J. Cosmol. Astropart. Phys., 10(10), 065–28pp.
Abstract: The observation of 236 MeV muon neutrinos from kaon-decay-at-rest (KDAR) originating in the core of the Sun would provide a unique signature of dark matter annihilation. Since excellent angle and energy reconstruction are necessary to detect this monoenergetic, directional neutrino flux, DUNE with its vast volume and reconstruction capabilities, is a promising candidate for a KDAR neutrino search. In this work, we evaluate the proposed KDAR neutrino search strategies by realistically modeling both neutrino-nucleus interactions and the response of DUNE. We find that, although reconstruction of the neutrino energy and direction is difficult with current techniques in the relevant energy range, the superb energy resolution, angular resolution, and particle identification offered by DUNE can still permit great signal/background discrimination. Moreover, there are non-standard scenarios in which searches at DUNE for KDAR in the Sun can probe dark matter interactions.
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Muñoz, V., Takhistov, V., Witte, S. J., & Fuller, G. M. (2021). Exploring the origin of supermassive black holes with coherent neutrino scattering. J. Cosmol. Astropart. Phys., 11(11), 020–16pp.
Abstract: Collapsing supermassive stars (M greater than or similar to 3 x 10(4) M-circle dot) at high redshifts can naturally provide seeds and explain the origin of the supermassive black holes observed in the centers of nearly all galaxies. During the collapse of supermassive stars, a burst of non-thermal neutrinos is generated with a luminosity that could greatly exceed that of a conventional core collapse supernova explosion. In this work, we investigate the extent to which the neutrinos produced in these explosions can be observed via coherent elastic neutrino-nucleus scattering (CEvNS). Large scale direct dark matter detection experiments provide particularly favorable targets. We find that upcoming O(100) tonne-scale experiments will be sensitive to the collapse of individual supermassive stars at distances as large as O(10) Mpc.
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Afonso, V. I., Mora-Perez, G., Olmo, G. J., Orazi, E., & Rubiera-Garcia, D. (2022). An infinite class of exact rotating black hole metrics of modified gravity. J. Cosmol. Astropart. Phys., 03(3), 052–14pp.
Abstract: We build an infinite class of exact axisymmetric solutions of a metric-affine gravity theory, namely, Eddington-inspired Born-Infeld gravity, coupled to an anisotropic fluid as a matter source. The solution-generating method employed is not unique of this theory but can be extended to other Ricci-Based Gravity theories (RBGs), a class of theories built out of contractions of the Ricci tensor with the metric. This method exploits a correspondence between the space of solutions of General Relativity and that of RBGs, and is independent of the symmetries of the problem. For the particular case in which the fluid is identified with non-linear electromagnetic fields we explicitly derive the corresponding axisymmetric solutions. Finally, we use this result to work out the counterpart of the Kerr-Newman black hole when Maxwell electrodynamics is set on the metric-affine side. Our results open up an exciting new avenue for testing new gravitational phenomenology in the fields of gravitational waves and shadows out of rotating black holes.
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