Multi-messenger high-energy signatures of decaying dark matter and the effect of background light
Abstract The IceCube Neutrino Observatory at the South Pole has measured astrophysical neutrinos using through-going and starting events in the TeV to PeV energy range. The origin of these astrophysical neutrinos is still largely unresolved, and among their potential sources could be dark matter dec...
Published in: | Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics |
---|---|
Main Authors: | , , |
Format: | Article in Journal/Newspaper |
Language: | unknown |
Published: |
IOP Publishing
2023
|
Subjects: | |
Online Access: | http://dx.doi.org/10.1088/1475-7516/2023/01/037 https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1475-7516/2023/01/037 https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1475-7516/2023/01/037/pdf |
id |
crioppubl:10.1088/1475-7516/2023/01/037 |
---|---|
record_format |
openpolar |
spelling |
crioppubl:10.1088/1475-7516/2023/01/037 2024-06-23T07:56:50+00:00 Multi-messenger high-energy signatures of decaying dark matter and the effect of background light Skrzypek, B. Chianese, M. Argüelles, C.A. 2023 http://dx.doi.org/10.1088/1475-7516/2023/01/037 https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1475-7516/2023/01/037 https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1475-7516/2023/01/037/pdf unknown IOP Publishing https://iopscience.iop.org/page/copyright https://iopscience.iop.org/info/page/text-and-data-mining Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics volume 2023, issue 01, page 037 ISSN 1475-7516 journal-article 2023 crioppubl https://doi.org/10.1088/1475-7516/2023/01/037 2024-05-27T13:03:18Z Abstract The IceCube Neutrino Observatory at the South Pole has measured astrophysical neutrinos using through-going and starting events in the TeV to PeV energy range. The origin of these astrophysical neutrinos is still largely unresolved, and among their potential sources could be dark matter decay. Measurements of the astrophysical flux using muon neutrinos are in slight tension with starting event measurements. This tension is driven by an excess observed in the energy range of 40–200 TeV with respect to the through-going expectation. Previous works have considered the possibility that this excess may be due to heavy dark matter decay and have placed constraints using gamma-ray and neutrino data. However, these constraints are not without caveats, since they rely on the modeling of the astrophysical neutrino flux and the sources of gamma-ray emission. In this work, we derive background-agnostic galactic and extragalactic constraints on decaying dark matter by considering Tibet-AS γ data, Fermi-LAT diffuse data, and the IceCube high-energy starting event sample. For the gamma-ray limits, we investigate the uncertainties on secondary emission from electromagnetic cascades during propagation arising from the unknown intensity of the extragalactic background light. We find that such uncertainties amount to a variation of up to ∼ 55% in the gamma-ray limits derived with extragalactic data. Our results imply that a significant fraction of the astrophysical neutrino flux could be due to dark matter and that ruling it out depends on the assumptions on the gamma-ray and neutrino background. The latter depends on the yet unidentified sources. Article in Journal/Newspaper South pole IOP Publishing South Pole Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics 2023 01 037 |
institution |
Open Polar |
collection |
IOP Publishing |
op_collection_id |
crioppubl |
language |
unknown |
description |
Abstract The IceCube Neutrino Observatory at the South Pole has measured astrophysical neutrinos using through-going and starting events in the TeV to PeV energy range. The origin of these astrophysical neutrinos is still largely unresolved, and among their potential sources could be dark matter decay. Measurements of the astrophysical flux using muon neutrinos are in slight tension with starting event measurements. This tension is driven by an excess observed in the energy range of 40–200 TeV with respect to the through-going expectation. Previous works have considered the possibility that this excess may be due to heavy dark matter decay and have placed constraints using gamma-ray and neutrino data. However, these constraints are not without caveats, since they rely on the modeling of the astrophysical neutrino flux and the sources of gamma-ray emission. In this work, we derive background-agnostic galactic and extragalactic constraints on decaying dark matter by considering Tibet-AS γ data, Fermi-LAT diffuse data, and the IceCube high-energy starting event sample. For the gamma-ray limits, we investigate the uncertainties on secondary emission from electromagnetic cascades during propagation arising from the unknown intensity of the extragalactic background light. We find that such uncertainties amount to a variation of up to ∼ 55% in the gamma-ray limits derived with extragalactic data. Our results imply that a significant fraction of the astrophysical neutrino flux could be due to dark matter and that ruling it out depends on the assumptions on the gamma-ray and neutrino background. The latter depends on the yet unidentified sources. |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Skrzypek, B. Chianese, M. Argüelles, C.A. |
spellingShingle |
Skrzypek, B. Chianese, M. Argüelles, C.A. Multi-messenger high-energy signatures of decaying dark matter and the effect of background light |
author_facet |
Skrzypek, B. Chianese, M. Argüelles, C.A. |
author_sort |
Skrzypek, B. |
title |
Multi-messenger high-energy signatures of decaying dark matter and the effect of background light |
title_short |
Multi-messenger high-energy signatures of decaying dark matter and the effect of background light |
title_full |
Multi-messenger high-energy signatures of decaying dark matter and the effect of background light |
title_fullStr |
Multi-messenger high-energy signatures of decaying dark matter and the effect of background light |
title_full_unstemmed |
Multi-messenger high-energy signatures of decaying dark matter and the effect of background light |
title_sort |
multi-messenger high-energy signatures of decaying dark matter and the effect of background light |
publisher |
IOP Publishing |
publishDate |
2023 |
url |
http://dx.doi.org/10.1088/1475-7516/2023/01/037 https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1475-7516/2023/01/037 https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1475-7516/2023/01/037/pdf |
geographic |
South Pole |
geographic_facet |
South Pole |
genre |
South pole |
genre_facet |
South pole |
op_source |
Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics volume 2023, issue 01, page 037 ISSN 1475-7516 |
op_rights |
https://iopscience.iop.org/page/copyright https://iopscience.iop.org/info/page/text-and-data-mining |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1088/1475-7516/2023/01/037 |
container_title |
Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics |
container_volume |
2023 |
container_issue |
01 |
container_start_page |
037 |
_version_ |
1802650200823562240 |