Abstract
As experimental searches for WIMP dark matter continue to yield null results, models beyond the WIMP paradigm have proliferated in order to elude ever improving observational constraints, among them that of sub-GeV dark matter mediated by a massive vector portal (a dark photon) associated with a new dark U(1) gauge symmetry. It has been previously noted that for a significant range of the parameter space of this class of models, the annihilation of dark matter particles into a pair of dark photons can dominate the freeze-out process even when this process is kinematically forbidden for dark matter at rest — this is known as the “forbidden dark matter” (FDM) regime. Prior studies of this regime, however, assume that any “dark Higgs” associated with breaking the dark U(1) and imparting mass to the dark photon is decoupled from the dark matter and as such plays no role in the freeze-out process. In this paper, we explore the effects of a dark Higgs on sub-GeV dark matter phenomenology in this FDM regime by considering the simplest possible construction in which there exist non-trivial dark matter-dark Higgs couplings: a model with a single complex scalar DM candidate coupled directly to the dark Higgs field. We find that for a wide range of parameter space, the dark Higgs can alter the resulting relic abundance by many orders of magnitude, and that this effect can remain significant even for a small dark matter-dark Higgs coupling constant. Considering measurements from direct detection and measurements of the CMB, we further find that points in this model’s parameter space which recreate the appropriate dark matter relic abundance suffer only mild constraints from other sources at present, but may become accessible in near-future direct detection experiments.
Article PDF
Similar content being viewed by others
Explore related subjects
Discover the latest articles, news and stories from top researchers in related subjects.Avoid common mistakes on your manuscript.
References
G. Arcadi et al., The waning of the WIMP? A review of models, searches, and constraints, Eur. Phys. J. C 78 (2018) 203 [arXiv:1703.07364] [INSPIRE].
L. Roszkowski, E.M. Sessolo and S. Trojanowski, WIMP dark matter candidates and searches — current status and future prospects, Rept. Prog. Phys. 81 (2018) 066201 [arXiv:1707.06277] [INSPIRE].
M. Kawasaki and K. Nakayama, Axions: Theory and Cosmological Role, Ann. Rev. Nucl. Part. Sci. 63 (2013) 69 [arXiv:1301.1123] [INSPIRE].
P.W. Graham, I.G. Irastorza, S.K. Lamoreaux, A. Lindner and K.A. van Bibber, Experimental Searches for the Axion and Axion-Like Particles, Ann. Rev. Nucl. Part. Sci. 65 (2015) 485 [arXiv:1602.00039] [INSPIRE].
I.G. Irastorza and J. Redondo, New experimental approaches in the search for axion-like particles, Prog. Part. Nucl. Phys. 102 (2018) 89 [arXiv:1801.08127] [INSPIRE].
M. Battaglieri et al., US Cosmic Visions: New Ideas in Dark Matter 2017: Community Report, arXiv:1707.04591 [INSPIRE].
J. Alexander et al., Dark Sectors 2016 Workshop: Community Report, (2016) [arXiv:1608.08632] [INSPIRE].
Planck collaboration, Planck 2018 results. VI. Cosmological parameters, Astron. Astrophys. 641 (2020) A6 [Erratum ibid. 652 (2021) C4] [arXiv:1807.06209] [INSPIRE].
B. Holdom, Two U(1)’s and Epsilon Charge Shifts, Phys. Lett. B 166 (1986) 196 [INSPIRE].
B. Holdom, Searching for ϵ Charges and a New U(1), Phys. Lett. B 178 (1986) 65 [INSPIRE].
M. Pospelov, A. Ritz and M.B. Voloshin, Secluded WIMP Dark Matter, Phys. Lett. B 662 (2008) 53 [arXiv:0711.4866] [INSPIRE].
E. Izaguirre, G. Krnjaic, P. Schuster and N. Toro, Analyzing the Discovery Potential for Light Dark Matter, Phys. Rev. Lett. 115 (2015) 251301 [arXiv:1505.00011] [INSPIRE].
R. Essig et al., Working Group Report: New Light Weakly Coupled Particles, arXiv:1311.0029 [INSPIRE].
D. Curtin, R. Essig, S. Gori and J. Shelton, Illuminating Dark Photons with High-Energy Colliders, JHEP 02 (2015) 157 [arXiv:1412.0018] [INSPIRE].
T. Gherghetta, J. Kersten, K. Olive and M. Pospelov, Evaluating the price of tiny kinetic mixing, Phys. Rev. D 100 (2019) 095001 [arXiv:1909.00696] [INSPIRE].
T.D. Rueter and T.G. Rizzo, Building Kinetic Mixing From Scalar Portal Matter, arXiv:2011.03529 [INSPIRE].
T.G. Rizzo, Kinetic Mixing and Portal Matter Phenomenology, Phys. Rev. D 99 (2019) 115024 [arXiv:1810.07531] [INSPIRE].
J.H. Kim, S.D. Lane, H.-S. Lee, I.M. Lewis and M. Sullivan, Searching for Dark Photons with Maverick Top Partners, Phys. Rev. D 101 (2020) 035041 [arXiv:1904.05893] [INSPIRE].
P. Gondolo and G. Gelmini, Cosmic abundances of stable particles: Improved analysis, Nucl. Phys. B 360 (1991) 145 [INSPIRE].
K. Saikawa and S. Shirai, Precise WIMP Dark Matter Abundance and Standard Model Thermodynamics, JCAP 08 (2020) 011 [arXiv:2005.03544] [INSPIRE].
L. Darmé, S. Rao and L. Roszkowski, Light dark Higgs boson in minimal sub-GeV dark matter scenarios, JHEP 03 (2018) 084 [arXiv:1710.08430] [INSPIRE].
K. Griest and D. Seckel, Three exceptions in the calculation of relic abundances, Phys. Rev. D 43 (1991) 3191 [INSPIRE].
A. Delgado, A. Martin and N. Raj, Forbidden Dark Matter at the Weak Scale via the Top Portal, Phys. Rev. D 95 (2017) 035002 [arXiv:1608.05345] [INSPIRE].
R.T. D’Agnolo and J.T. Ruderman, Light Dark Matter from Forbidden Channels, Phys. Rev. Lett. 115 (2015) 061301 [arXiv:1505.07107] [INSPIRE].
J.M. Cline, H. Liu, T. Slatyer and W. Xue, Enabling Forbidden Dark Matter, Phys. Rev. D 96 (2017) 083521 [arXiv:1702.07716] [INSPIRE].
P.J. Fitzpatrick, H. Liu, T.R. Slatyer and Y.-D. Tsai, New Pathways to the Relic Abundance of Vector-Portal Dark Matter, arXiv:2011.01240 [INSPIRE].
T. Hara, S. Kanemura and T. Katayose, Is light thermal scalar dark matter possible?, Phys. Rev. D 105 (2022) 035035 [arXiv:2109.03553] [INSPIRE].
ATLAS collaboration, Combination of searches for invisible Higgs boson decays with the ATLAS experiment, Phys. Rev. Lett. 122 (2019) 231801 [arXiv:1904.05105] [INSPIRE].
C. Boehm and P. Fayet, Scalar dark matter candidates, Nucl. Phys. B 683 (2004) 219 [hep-ph/0305261] [INSPIRE].
M. Hindmarsh and O. Philipsen, WIMP dark matter and the QCD equation of state, Phys. Rev. D 71 (2005) 087302 [hep-ph/0501232] [INSPIRE].
R. Essig, M. Fernandez-Serra, J. Mardon, A. Soto, T. Volansky and T.-T. Yu, Direct Detection of sub-GeV Dark Matter with Semiconductor Targets, JHEP 05 (2016) 046 [arXiv:1509.01598] [INSPIRE].
R. Essig, T. Volansky and T.-T. Yu, New Constraints and Prospects for sub-GeV Dark Matter Scattering off Electrons in Xenon, Phys. Rev. D 96 (2017) 043017 [arXiv:1703.00910] [INSPIRE].
XENON collaboration, Light Dark Matter Search with Ionization Signals in XENON1T, Phys. Rev. Lett. 123 (2019) 251801 [arXiv:1907.11485] [INSPIRE].
R. Essig, A. Manalaysay, J. Mardon, P. Sorensen and T. Volansky, First Direct Detection Limits on sub-GeV Dark Matter from XENON10, Phys. Rev. Lett. 109 (2012) 021301 [arXiv:1206.2644] [INSPIRE].
DarkSide collaboration, Constraints on Sub-GeV Dark-Matter-Electron Scattering from the DarkSide-50 Experiment, Phys. Rev. Lett. 121 (2018) 111303 [arXiv:1802.06998] [INSPIRE].
M. Fabbrichesi, E. Gabrielli and G. Lanfranchi, The Dark Photon, arXiv:2005.01515 [INSPIRE].
H. Merkel et al., Search at the Mainz Microtron for Light Massive Gauge Bosons Relevant for the Muon g-2 Anomaly, Phys. Rev. Lett. 112 (2014) 221802 [arXiv:1404.5502] [INSPIRE].
NA48/2 collaboration, Search for the dark photon in π0 decays, Phys. Lett. B 746 (2015) 178 [arXiv:1504.00607] [INSPIRE].
LHCb collaboration, Search for A′ → μ+μ− Decays, Phys. Rev. Lett. 124 (2020) 041801 [arXiv:1910.06926] [INSPIRE].
J. Edsjo and P. Gondolo, Neutralino relic density including coannihilations, Phys. Rev. D 56 (1997) 1879 [hep-ph/9704361] [INSPIRE].
G. Bélanger, F. Boudjema, A. Pukhov and A. Semenov, MicrOMEGAs 2.0: A program to calculate the relic density of dark matter in a generic model, Comput. Phys. Commun. 176 (2007) 367 [hep-ph/0607059] [INSPIRE].
SENSEI collaboration, SENSEI: First Direct-Detection Constraints on sub-GeV Dark Matter from a Surface Run, Phys. Rev. Lett. 121 (2018) 061803 [arXiv:1804.00088] [INSPIRE].
SuperCDMS collaboration, First Dark Matter Constraints from a SuperCDMS Single-Charge Sensitive Detector, Phys. Rev. Lett. 121 (2018) 051301 [Erratum ibid. 122 (2019) 069901] [arXiv:1804.10697] [INSPIRE].
DAMIC-M collaboration, DAMIC-M Experiment: Thick, Silicon CCDs to search for Light Dark Matter, Nucl. Instrum. Meth. A 958 (2020) 162933 [arXiv:2001.01476] [INSPIRE].
T.G. Rizzo, Dark initial state radiation and the kinetic mixing portal, JHEP 01 (2021) 079 [arXiv:2006.08502] [INSPIRE].
J. Cang, Y. Gao and Y.-Z. Ma, Probing dark matter with future CMB measurements, Phys. Rev. D 102 (2020) 103005 [arXiv:2002.03380] [INSPIRE].
T. Bringmann and S. Hofmann, Thermal decoupling of WIMPs from first principles, JCAP 04 (2007) 016 [Erratum ibid. 03 (2016) E02] [hep-ph/0612238] [INSPIRE].
Planck collaboration, Planck 2018 results. V. CMB power spectra and likelihoods, Astron. Astrophys. 641 (2020) A5 [arXiv:1907.12875] [INSPIRE].
BOSS collaboration, The clustering of galaxies in the completed SDSS-III Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey: cosmological analysis of the DR12 galaxy sample, Mon. Not. Roy. Astron. Soc. 470 (2017) 2617 [arXiv:1607.03155] [INSPIRE].
F. Beutler et al., The 6dF Galaxy Survey: Baryon Acoustic Oscillations and the Local Hubble Constant, Mon. Not. Roy. Astron. Soc. 416 (2011) 3017 [arXiv:1106.3366] [INSPIRE].
A.J. Ross, L. Samushia, C. Howlett, W.J. Percival, A. Burden and M. Manera, The clustering of the SDSS DR7 main Galaxy sample — I. A 4 per cent distance measure at z = 0.15, Mon. Not. Roy. Astron. Soc. 449 (2015) 835 [arXiv:1409.3242] [INSPIRE].
K. Bondarenko, A. Sokolenko, A. Boyarsky, A. Robertson, D. Harvey and Y. Revaz, From dwarf galaxies to galaxy clusters: Self-Interacting Dark Matter over 7 orders of magnitude in halo mass, JCAP 01 (2021) 043 [arXiv:2006.06623] [INSPIRE].
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Additional information
Publisher’s Note
Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
ArXiv ePrint: 2109.07369
Rights and permissions
Open Access . This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC-BY 4.0), which permits any use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author(s) and source are credited.
About this article
Cite this article
Wojcik, G.N., Rizzo, T.G. Forbidden scalar dark matter and dark Higgses. J. High Energ. Phys. 2022, 33 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/JHEP04(2022)033
Received:
Revised:
Accepted:
Published:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/JHEP04(2022)033