Alignment without Decoupling: the Portal to Light Dark Matter in the MSSM

Abstract

We study light, thermal neutralino dark matter in the sub-GeV to 65 GeV mass range in the Minimal Supersymmetric extension of the Standard Model (MSSM). We consider realizations of the limit of alignment without decoupling in the Higgs sector where the heavier CP-even Higgs impersonates the observed Higgs state at 125 GeV, while the lighter CP-even Higgs is the mediator of dark matter annihilation. We single out three distinct and novel possibilities for light dark matter: (i) a neutralino with mass around half the light Higgs mass, in the sub-GeV to 30 GeV mass range; (ii) a neutralino with a mass around half the pseudoscalar Higgs boson mass, in our examples around 60 to 65 GeV; (iii) a very light neutralino with mass around the light Higgs mass, pair-annihilating to Higgs pairs. We discuss the implications of all these possibilities for indirect and direct dark matter detection experiments, and we demonstrate that all scenarios will be tested by next generation direct detection experiments. We also emphasize that the unique Higgs phenomenology of these scenarios warrants a dedicated search program at the LHC.

9 pages, 2 figures, 3 tables; v2: minor changes, added discussion of dominant annihilation final states, matches published version in PRD

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Cited by in corpus (5)

• The Light and Heavy Higgs Interpretation of the MSSM
• The Not-So-Well Tempered Neutralino
• The Impact of Two-Loop Effects on the Scenario of MSSM Higgs Alignment without Decoupling
• Probing GeV-scale MSSM neutralino dark matter in collider and direct detection experiments
• Light right-handed Smuons at the LHC: Natural dark matter and $g_{\mu }-2$ in an unexplored realm of the pMSSM