SUSY-QCD effects on neutralino dark matter annihilation beyond scalar or gaugino mass unification

TL;DR

This paper calculates the full SUSY-QCD corrections to neutralino annihilation into heavy quarks, emphasizing their importance in accurately determining dark matter relic density in models without scalar or gaugino mass unification.

Contribution

It provides a detailed calculation of SUSY-QCD effects on neutralino annihilation beyond common unification assumptions, extending the analysis to more general scenarios.

Findings

SUSY-QCD corrections significantly affect annihilation cross sections.

Corrections are crucial for precise dark matter relic density predictions.

Impact is substantial in models with top quark final states.

Abstract

We describe in detail our calculation of the full supersymmetric (SUSY) QCD corrections to neutralino annihilation into heavy quarks and extend our numerical analysis of the resulting dark matter relic density to scenarios without scalar or gaugino mass unification. In these scenarios, the final state is often composed of top quarks and the annihilation proceeds through Z^0-boson or scalar top-quark exchanges. The impact of the corrections is again shown to be sizable, so that they must be taken into account systematically in global analyses of the supersymmetry parameter space.