Late Energy Injection and Cosmological Constraints in Axino Dark Matter Scenarios

TL;DR

This paper investigates how late energy injection from long-lived sleptons in axino dark matter models affects big bang nucleosynthesis constraints, leading to new bounds on model parameters.

Contribution

It provides detailed calculations of slepton decay processes and derives the most restrictive BBN constraints for supersymmetric hadronic axion models to date.

Findings

Hadronic BBN constraints can be more restrictive than catalyzed BBN.

New upper limits on the Peccei-Quinn scale are established.

Late energy injection significantly impacts axino dark matter viability.

Abstract

Taking into account effects of late energy injection, we examine big bang nucleosynthesis (BBN) constraints on axino dark matter scenarios with long-lived charged sleptons. We calculate 4-body slepton decays into the axino, a lepton, and a quark-antiquark pair since they govern late hadronic energy injection and associated BBN constraints. For supersymmetric hadronic axion models, we present the obtained hadronic BBN constraints and show that they can be more restrictive than the ones associated with catalyzed BBN via slepton-bound-state formation. From the BBN constraints on hadronic and electromagnetic energy release, we find new upper limits on the Peccei-Quinn scale.