On the Impact of Dark Matter Scattering on the Trajectory of High-Energy Cosmic Rays

Abstract

We study the impact on the trajectory of high-energy cosmic-ray protons of scattering off the cosmic dark matter. We compute the scattering angle as a function of the cosmic-ray energy, of the dark matter mass, and of the interaction strength for a few representative choices for the relevant interaction cross section. We find that the typical deflection angle over the cosmic ray path is largely independent of the dark matter mass. Given existing limits on the interaction strength, we compute the average deflection angle. We find that for large interaction cross sections and low cosmic ray energies, the predicted deflection angle is much larger than the angular resolution of very high-energy cosmic-ray observatories such as Pierre Auger.

arXiv comment26 pages, 9 Figures

References in corpus (9)

• Ultralight scalars as cosmological dark matter
• The Pierre Auger Cosmic Ray Observatory
• Wave Dark Matter
• Migdal Effect in Dark Matter Direct Detection Experiments
• Strong New Limits on Light Dark Matter from Neutrino Experiments
• Cosmic Ray Models
• Blazar-Boosted Dark Matter at Super-Kamiokande
• Direct Detection Limits on Heavy Dark Matter
• Ultra-high energy cosmic rays deflection by the Intergalactic Magnetic Field