Gamma Rays From The Galactic Center and the WMAP Haze

TL;DR

This paper investigates whether gamma rays from the Galactic Center, potentially from dark matter annihilation, can explain the WMAP Haze through predicted synchrotron emission, linking gamma-ray data with microwave observations.

Contribution

The study calculates synchrotron emission from dark matter annihilation and demonstrates it can account for the WMAP Haze's intensity, spectrum, and shape.

Findings

Predicted synchrotron flux matches the observed WMAP Haze.

Dark matter particles of 7.3-9.2 GeV can produce the gamma-ray and synchrotron signals.

The scenario links gamma-ray signals with microwave observations of the Galactic Center.

Abstract

Recently, an analysis of data from the Fermi Gamma Ray Space Telescope has revealed a flux of gamma rays concentrated around the inner ~0.5 degrees of the Milky Way, with a spectrum that is sharply peaked at 2-4 GeV. If interpreted as the products of annihilating dark matter, this signal implies that the dark matter consists of particles with a mass between 7.3 and 9.2 GeV annihilating primarily to charged leptons. This mass range is very similar to that required to accommodate the signals reported by CoGeNT and DAMA/LIBRA. In addition to gamma rays, the dark matter is predicted to produce energetic electrons and positrons in the Inner Galaxy, which emit synchrotron photons as a result of their interaction with the galactic magnetic field. In this letter, we calculate the flux and spectrum of this synchrotron emission assuming that the gamma rays from the Galactic Center originate from dark matter, and compare the results to measurements from the WMAP satellite. We find that a sizable flux of hard synchrotron emission is predicted in this scenario, and that this can easily account for the observed intensity, spectrum, and morphology of the "WMAP Haze".