• Open Access

Directly Detecting Signals from Absorption of Fermionic Dark Matter

Jeff A. Dror, Gilly Elor, and Robert McGehee
Phys. Rev. Lett. 124, 181301 – Published 4 May 2020

Abstract

We present a new class of direct detection signals; absorption of fermionic dark matter. We enumerate the operators through dimension six which lead to fermionic absorption, study their direct detection prospects, and summarize additional constraints on their suppression scale. Such dark matter is inherently unstable as there is no symmetry which prevents dark matter decays. Nevertheless, we show that fermionic dark matter absorption can be observed in direct detection and neutrino experiments while ensuring consistency with the observed dark matter abundance and required lifetime. For dark matter masses well below the GeV scale, dedicated searches for these signals at current and future experiments can probe orders of magnitude of unexplored parameter space.

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  • Received 5 June 2019
  • Revised 2 March 2020
  • Accepted 16 April 2020

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.124.181301

Published by the American Physical Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article’s title, journal citation, and DOI. Funded by SCOAP3.

Published by the American Physical Society

Physics Subject Headings (PhySH)

Gravitation, Cosmology & AstrophysicsParticles & Fields

Authors & Affiliations

Jeff A. Dror1,2, Gilly Elor3, and Robert McGehee2,1

  • 1Theory Group, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, California 94720, USA
  • 2Berkeley Center for Theoretical Physics, University of California, Berkeley, California 94720, USA
  • 3Department of Physics, Box 1560, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington 98195, USA

Article Text

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Issue

Vol. 124, Iss. 18 — 8 May 2020

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