Turning off the Lights: How Dark is Dark Matter?

Abstract

We consider current observational constraints on the electromagnetic charge of dark matter. The velocity dependence of the scattering cross-section through the photon gives rise to qualitatively different constraints than standard dark matter scattering through massive force carriers. In particular, recombination epoch observations of dark matter density perturbations require that $\epsilon$, the ratio of the dark matter to electronic charge, is less than $10^{-6}$ for $m_X=1GeV$, rising to $\epsilon <10^{-4}$ for $m_X=10TeV$. Though naively one would expect that dark matter carrying a charge well below this constraint could still give rise to large scattering in current direct detection experiments, we show that charged dark matter particles that could be detected with upcoming experiments are expected to be evacuated from the Galactic disk by the Galactic magnetic fields and supernova shock waves, and hence will not give rise to a signal. Thus dark matter with a small charge is likely not a source of a signal in current or upcoming dark matter direct detection experiments.

19 pages, 2 figures; v2 - figures fixed, references added

References in corpus (57)

• Particle Dark Matter: Evidence, Candidates and Constraints
• Supersymmetric Dark Matter
• Observational evidence for self-interacting cold dark matter
• A Theory of Dark Matter
• Dark Matter Candidates from Particle Physics and Methods of Detection
• First results from DAMA/LIBRA and the combined results with DAMA/NaI
• Direct constraints on the dark matter self-interaction cross-section from the merging galaxy cluster 1E0657-56
• Results from the Final Exposure of the CDMS II Experiment
• Cosmology and Astrophysics of Minimal Dark Matter
• Non-Perturbative Effect on Dark Matter Annihilation and Gamma Ray Signature from Galactic Center
• Astrophysical Signatures of Secluded Dark Matter
• Model-independent implications of the e+, e-, anti-proton cosmic ray spectra on properties of Dark Matter
• Non-perturbative Effect on Thermal Relic Abundance of Dark Matter
• Explosive Dark Matter Annihilation
• Updated Bounds on Milli-Charged Particles
• Hidden Charged Dark Matter
• First Dark Matter Results from the XENON100 Experiment
• Dark Matter and Dark Radiation
• Halo Properties in Cosmological Simulations of Self-Interacting Cold Dark Matter
• The Stueckelberg $Z^{\prime }$ Extension with Kinetic Mixing and Milli-Charged Dark Matter From the Hidden Sector
• Halo Shape and Relic Density Exclusions of Sommerfeld-Enhanced Dark Matter Explanations of Cosmic Ray Excesses
• Dark-Matter Electric and Magnetic Dipole Moments
• Sommerfeld Enhancements for Thermal Relic Dark Matter
• Leptophilic Dark Matter
• Thermal Relics in Hidden Sectors
• A Chandra View of Dark Matter in Early-Type Galaxies
• Heavy Dark Matter Through the Higgs Portal
• Constraining Dark Matter candidates from structure formation
• A Heavy Gluino as the Lightest Supersymmetric Particle
• Can the WIMP annihilation boost factor be boosted by the Sommerfeld enhancement?
• The Sommerfeld enhancement for dark matter with an excited state
• Unitarity and Higher-Order Corrections in Neutralino Dark Matter Annihilation into Two Photons
• Sommerfeld enhancement: general results from field theory diagrams
• Chandra Evidence for a Flattened, Triaxial Dark Matter Halo in the Elliptical Galaxy NGC 720
• Narrowing the window for millicharged particles by CMB anisotropy
• Interacting Dark Matter disguised as Warm Dark Matter
• Reopening the window on charged dark matter
• A Quantitative Study of Interacting Dark Matter in Halos
• Collisional versus Collisionless Dark Matter
• Mirror dark matter and the new DAMA/LIBRA results: A simple explanation for a beautiful experiment
• Constraints on inelastic dark matter from XENON10
• Collisional dark matter and the structure of dark halos
• Dark Moments and the DAMA-CoGeNT Puzzle
• Multicomponent Dark Matter in Supersymmetric Hidden Sector Extensions
• Relic density and CMB constraints on dark matter annihilation with Sommerfeld enhancement
• Astrophysical Bounds on Milli-Charged Particles in Models with a Paraphoton
• Hidden gauginos of an unbroken U(1): Cosmological constraints and phenomenological prospects
• Early Annihilation and Diffuse Backgrounds in 1/v WIMP models
• Thermal Relic Abundances of Particles with Velocity-Dependent Interactions
• A comprehensive analysis of the dark matter direct detection experiments in the mirror dark matter framework
• Constraints on dark matter particles charged under a hidden gauge group from primordial black holes
• Distinguishing Dark Matter Annihilation Enhancement Scenarios via Halo Shapes
• Late time CMB anisotropies constrain mini-charged particles
• Levitating Dark Matter
• Dark Matter Constraints from a Cosmic Index of Refraction
• On the fraction of dark matter in charged massive particles (CHAMPs)
• Clumpiness enhancement of charged cosmic rays from dark matter annihilation with Sommerfeld effect

Cited by in corpus (180)

• The Waning of the WIMP? A Review of Models, Searches, and Constraints
• Direct Detection of Sub-GeV Dark Matter
• Possible interaction between baryons and dark-matter particles revealed by the first stars
• Cosmological Simulations with Self-Interacting Dark Matter II: Halo Shapes vs. Observations
• Supernova 1987A Constraints on Sub-GeV Dark Sectors, Millicharged Particles, the QCD Axion, and an Axion-like Particle
• The Four Basic Ways of Creating Dark Matter Through a Portal
• Constraining Dark Matter-Baryon Scattering with Linear Cosmology
• First Dark Matter Constraints from a SuperCDMS Single-Charge Sensitive Detector
• Insights on Dark Matter from Hydrogen during Cosmic Dawn
• Superconducting Detectors for Super Light Dark Matter
• ETHOS - An Effective Theory of Structure Formation: From dark particle physics to the matter distribution of the Universe
• Severely Constraining Dark Matter Interpretations of the 21-cm Anomaly
• Testing the black hole "no-hair" hypothesis
• SENSEI: First Direct-Detection Constraints on sub-GeV Dark Matter from a Surface Run
• Dark Radiation constraints on minicharged particles in models with a hidden photon
• Signs of Dark Matter at 21-cm?
• Millicharged Atomic Dark Matter
• Detecting Superlight Dark Matter with Fermi-Degenerate Materials
• Early-Universe Constraints on Dark Matter-Baryon Scattering and their Implications for a Global 21cm Signal
• Semiconductor Probes of Light Dark Matter
• Search for Millicharged Particles Using Optically Levitated Microspheres
• Probing sub-GeV Dark Matter-Baryon Scattering with Cosmological Observables
• Non-Abelian dark matter and dark radiation
• Constraints on Large-Scale Dark Acoustic Oscillations from Cosmology
• On Symmetric and Asymmetric Light Dark Matter
• Composite strongly interacting dark matter
• Direct Detection of Strongly Interacting Sub-GeV Dark Matter via Electron Recoils
• Tighter Limits on Dark Matter Explanations of the Anomalous EDGES 21cm Signal
• Making dark matter out of light: freeze-in from plasma effects
• Reviving Millicharged Dark Matter for 21-cm Cosmology
• Too Hot, Too Cold or Just Right? Implications of a 21-cm Signal for Dark Matter Annihilation and Decay
• Black holes and gravitational waves in models of minicharged dark matter
• How Dark Are Majorana WIMPs? Signals from MiDM and Rayleigh Dark Matter
• The Effects of Dark Matter-Baryon Scattering on Redshifted 21 cm Signals
• Scattering, Damping, and Acoustic Oscillations: Simulating the Structure of Dark Matter Halos with Relativistic Force Carriers
• Using the CMB angular power spectrum to study Dark Matter-photon interactions
• Cosmological Constraints on Dark Matter Interactions with Ordinary Matter
• Relativistic capture of dark matter by electrons in neutron stars
• Searches for light dark matter using condensed matter systems
• Direct Detection is testing Freeze-in
• Constraints on Dark Matter with a moderately large and velocity-dependent DM-nucleon cross-section
• Dynamical friction of black holes in ultralight dark matter
• Heating of the intergalactic medium by the cosmic microwave background during cosmic dawn
• Bounds on Dark Matter Interactions with Electroweak Gauge Bosons
• Generalized Halo Independent Comparison of Direct Dark Matter Detection Data
• Constraints on millicharged dark matter and axion-like particles from timing of radio waves
• The cosmology of sub-MeV dark matter freeze-in
• Two Lines or Not Two Lines? That is the Question of Gamma Ray Spectra
• Spontaneous Mirror Parity Violation, Common Origin of Matter and Dark Matter, and the LHC Signatures
• 130 GeV dark matter and the Fermi gamma-ray line
• Search for a Non-Relativistic Component in the Spectrum of Cosmic Rays at Earth
• Direct detection of primordial black hole relics as dark matter
• Gas-rich dwarf galaxies as a new probe of dark matter interactions with ordinary matter
• Galactic Center Gas Clouds and Novel Bounds on Ultra-Light Dark Photon, Vector Portal, Strongly Interacting, Composite, and Super-Heavy Dark Matter
• Three Exceptions for Thermal Dark Matter with Enhanced Annihilation to Gamma Gamma
• Hairy binary black holes in Einstein-Maxwell-dilaton theory and their effective-one-body description
• Light dark states with electromagnetic form factors
• Observational constraints on dark matter scattering with electrons
• A Dark Matter Interpretation of Excesses in Multiple Direct Detection Experiments
• Calorimetric Dark Matter Detection With Galactic Center Gas Clouds
• The Waning of the WIMP: Endgame?
• Requiem for an FCHAMP?
• A fresh look into the interacting dark matter scenario
• Evidence for Dark Matter Self-Interactions via Collisionless Shocks in Cluster Mergers
• General Dynamics of Varying-Alpha Universes
• Direct Detection of Bound States of Asymmetric Dark Matter
• CHAMP Cosmic Rays
• Probing sub-GeV mass SIMP dark matter with a low-threshold surface experiment
• Charged Composite Scalar Dark Matter
• The full Boltzmann hierarchy for dark matter-massive neutrino interactions
• Millicharge or Decay: A Critical Take on Minimal Dark Matter
• Multiple Gamma Lines from Semi-Annihilation
• A Milli-Window to Another World
• Millicharged Cosmic Rays and Low Recoil Detectors
• Emergence of the mass discrepancy-acceleration relation from dark matter-baryon interactions
• Dark Matter microphysics and 21 cm observations
• Detecting Composite Dark Matter with Long Range and Contact Interactions in Gas Clouds
• Self-interacting dark matter without prejudice
• Les Houches Lectures on Indirect Detection of Dark Matter
• Mirror dark matter interpretations of the DAMA, CoGeNT and CRESST-II data
• Dark atoms and composite dark matter
• New Limits on Charged Dark Matter from Large-Scale Coherent Magnetic Fields
• Dark matter direct detection of a fermionic singlet at one loop
• Stepped Partially Acoustic Dark Matter, Large Scale Structure, and the Hubble Tension
• Dark sector-photon interactions in proton-beam experiments
• Probing dark matter particles at CEPC
• Categorisation and Detection of Dark Matter Candidates from String/M-theory Hidden Sectors
• Constraints on $\gamma$-CDM interactions matching the Planck data precision
• Shining Light on Polarizable Dark Particles
• Looking for new charged states at the LHC: Signatures of Magnetic and Rayleigh Dark Matter
• Trapped electrons and ions as particle detectors
• Direct Deflection of Particle Dark Matter
• Dispersive Light Propagation at Cosmological Distances: Matter Effects
• Constraints on Light Magnetic Dipole Dark Matter from the ILC and SN 1987A
• Direct Detection of Mirror Matter in Twin Higgs Models
• Minimal self-interacting dark matter models with light mediator
• Dynamics of millicharged dark matter in supernova remnants
• The Dark Matter Inverse Problem: Extracting Particle Physics from Scattering Events
• Can a millicharged dark matter particle emit an observable gamma-ray line?
• Structure Formation and the Global 21-cm Signal in the Presence of Coulomb-like Dark Matter-Baryon Interactions
• Endothermic self-interacting dark matter in Milky Way-like dark matter haloes
• Point Sources from Dissipative Dark Matter
• Long range dark matter self-interactions and plasma instabilities
• Effects of electrically charged dark matter on cosmic microwave background anisotropies
• Millicharged Relics Reveal Massless Dark Photons
• Dark matter concentrations in galactic nuclei according to polytropic models
• Planck Mass Charged Gravitino Dark Matter
• Constraints on Dark Matter-Electron Scattering from Molecular Cloud Ionization
• Astrophysical Tests of Dark Matter Self-Interactions
• White Dwarf Bounds on CHAMPs
• A Simple Recipe for the 111 and 128 GeV Lines
• Milli-interacting Dark Matter
• Late Kinetic Decoupling of Light Magnetic Dipole Dark Matter
• Gamma Rays from Top-Mediated Dark Matter Annihilations
• Dark photon portal dark matter with the 21-cm anomaly
• TASI 2014 Lectures: The Hunt for Dark Matter
• Constraints on electron-scattering interpretation of XENON1T excess
• 21cmFirstCLASS I. Cosmological tool for $\Lambda$CDM and beyond
• Probing dark matter interactions with 21cm observations
• Meson production in air showers and the search for light exotic particles
• Statistical challenges in the search for dark matter
• COZMIC. I. Cosmological Zoom-in Simulations with Initial Conditions Beyond Cold Dark Matter
• Composite Millicharged Dark Matter
• Dark Matter Model or Mass, but Not Both: Assessing Near-Future Direct Searches with Benchmark-free Forecasting
• X-Ray Shapes of Elliptical Galaxies and Implications for Self-Interacting Dark Matter
• Supersymmetric Partially Interacting Dark Matter
• Cosmological constraints on the velocity-dependent baryon-dark matter coupling
• On dark atoms, massive dark photons and millicharged sub-components
• Leptoquarks and Real Singlets: A Richer Scalar Sector Behind the Origin of Dark Matter
• Astrophysical Plasma Instabilities induced by Long-Range Interacting Dark Matter
• Two-component millicharged dark matter and the EDGES 21cm signal
• Gravitational-wave event rates as a new probe for dark matter microphysics
• The Muon Magnetic Moment and Physics Beyond the Standard Model
• Is it Mixed dark matter or neutrino masses?
• Dark matter repulsion could thwart direct detection
• XQC and CSR constraints on strongly interacting dark matter with spin and velocity dependent cross sections
• Milli-interacting dark matter interpretation of the direct-search experiments
• Implications Of A Dark Sector U(1) For Gamma Ray Bursts
• Could the 21-cm absorption be explained by the dark matter suggested by ${}^8$Be transitions?
• Collisionless shocks in self-interacting dark matter
• Possible s-wave annihilation for MeV dark matter with the 21-cm absorption
• Sensitivity of the Global 21-cm Signal to Dark Matter-Baryon Scattering
• Neutrino masses and mixing from milli-charged dark matter
• Looking forward to inelastic DM with electromagnetic form factors at FASER and beam dump experiments
• Unexplained correlation between the Cosmic Microwave Background temperature and the local matter density distribution
• Boosting Asymmetric Charged DM via Thermalization
• Dark Matter phenomenology : from simplified WIMP models to refined alternative solutions
• Forecasting 21-cm power spectrum sensitivity to dark Matter-baryon scattering
• Updated cosmological constraints on Macroscopic Dark Matter
• Charge Quantization in the $\mathbb{CP}(1)$ Nonlinear Sigma-Model
• Glow in the Dark Matter: Observing galactic halos with scattered light
• Composite dark matter and direct-search experiments
• DESI forecast for Dark Matter-Neutrino interactions using EFTofLSS
• Constraints on Long-Ranged Interactions Between Dark Matter and the Standard Model
• Magnetic dipole moment of neutral particles from quantum corrections at two-loop order
• Reacceleration of charged dark matter
• Sensitivity of WIMP bounds on the velocity distribution in the limit of a massless mediator
• Gauge Coupling Unification with Hidden Photon, and Minicharged Dark Matter
• Underground Production of Electromagnetic Dark States by MeV-scale Electron Beams and Detection with CCDs
• Feebly Self-Interacting Cold Dark Matter: New theory for the Core-Halo structure in GLSB Galaxies
• EDGES of the dark forest: A new absorption window into the composite dark matter and large scale structure
• Dark matter scattering in astrophysical media: collective effects
• Bounding dark charges on binary black holes using gravitational waves
• Observing the influence of growing black holes on the pre-reionization IGM
• Decoupled Sectors and Wolf-Rayet Galaxies
• ILC sensitivity for leptophilic scalar dark matter
• Dimming Starlight with Dark Compact Objects
• 21 cm Cosmology Sensitivity to Small-Scale Structure: Warm vs Neutrino-Interacting Dark Matter
• Gravitational dynamics in the Higgs-dark matter sector toy model: the field theoretic perspective
• Dark Matter Energy Deposition and Production from the Table-Top to the Cosmos
• Producing and constraining self-interacting hidden sector dark matter
• Kinematical Observables in Semi-Invisible Decays
• Freeze-in Production of Non-Abelian Millicharged Vector Dark Matter
• Implications of baryon-dark matter interaction on IGM temperature and tSZ effect with magnetic field
• Data-Driven Predictions for Dark Photon and Millicharged Particle Production
• Constraining D-foam via the 21-cm Line
• Dark Unification: a UV-complete Theory of Asymmetric Dark Matter
• Scattering meets absorption in dark matter detection
• Signatures of supermassive charged gravitinos in liquid scintillator detectors
• Constraints on the velocity dispersion of Dark Matter from Cosmology and new bounds on scattering from the Cosmic Dawn