Fast Radio Bursts from Axion Stars

Abstract

Axions are one of the most promising candidates of dark matter. The axions have been shown to form miniclusters with masses $\sim 10^{-12}{M}_{\odot }$ and to become dominant component of dark matter. Some of the axion miniclusters condense to form axion stars. We have recently shown a possible origin of fast radio bursts ( FRBs ) by assuming that the axion stars are main component of halos: FRBs arise from the collisions between the axion stars and neutron stars. It is remarkable that the masses of the axion stars obtained by the comparison of the theoretical and observational event rates are coincident with the mass $\sim 10^{-12}{M}_{\odot }$. In this paper, we describe our model of FRBs in detail. We derive the approximate solutions of the axion stars with large radii and constraint their masses for the approximation to be valid. The FRBs are emitted by electrons in atmospheres of neutron stars. By calculating the optical depth of the atmospheres, we show that they are transparent for the radiations with the frequency given by the axion mass $m_a$ such as $m_a/2\pi \simeq 2.4$GHz$(m_a/10^{-5}\mathrm{eV})$. Although the radiations are linearly polarized when they are emitted, they are shown to be circularly polarized after they pass magnetospheres of neutron stars. We also show that the FRBs are not broadband and their frequencies have finite bandwidths owing to the thermal fluctuations of the electrons in the atmospheres of the neutron stars. The presence of the finite bandwidths is a distinctive feature of our model and can be tested observationally. Furthermore, we show that similar FRBs may arise when the axion stars collide with magnetic white dwarfs $B\sim 10^9$G. The distinctive feature is that the durations of the bursts are of the order of $0.1$second.

new results added, 13 pages, no figures

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