Microlensing towards the LMC: self lensing for OGLE-II and OGLE-III

TL;DR

This paper analyzes OGLE-III microlensing data towards the LMC, showing self-lensing can explain observed events and setting limits on MACHO dark matter in the Milky Way and LMC.

Contribution

It provides a comprehensive analysis of microlensing sources, emphasizing self-lensing and establishing new constraints on MACHO dark matter fractions.

Findings

Self-lensing explains observed microlensing candidates.

Limits on MACHO halo fraction are below 20% for certain masses.

Strong constraints on MACHO mass range from microlensing data.

Abstract

We present an analysis of the results of the OGLE-III microlensing campaign towards the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC). We evaluate for all the possible lens populations along the line of sight the expected microlensing quantities, number of events and duration. In particular we consider lensing by massive compact halo objects (MACHOs) in the dark matter haloes of both the Milky Way (MW) and the LMC, and "self lensing" by stars in the LMC bar and disc, in the MW disc and in the stellar haloes of both the LMC and the MW. As a result we find that the self-lensing signal is able to explain the 2 OGLE-III microlensing candidates. In particular, we estimate the expected MW disc signal to be almost as large as that from LMC stars and able, by itself, to explain the observed rate. We evaluate a 95% CL \emph{upper} limit for $f$, the halo mass fraction in form of MACHOs, in the range 10-20% for $(10^{-2}-0.5) \mathrm{M}_\odot$, and $f=24%$ for $1 \mathrm{M}_\odot$ (below 10% in this full range, and in particular below 5% for $(10^{-2}-0.1) \mathrm{M}_\odot$) for the Bright (All) samples of source stars. Furthermore, we find that these limits do not rise much even if we assume the observed events \emph{are} MACHOs. For the All sample we also evaluate a rather significant constraint on $f$ for larger values of the MACHO mass, in particular $f\sim 50%$ (95% CL) for $100 \mathrm{M}_\odot$, to date the stronger bound coming from microlensing analyses in this mass range. Finally, we discuss these results in the framework of the previous observational campaigns towards the LMC, that of the MACHO and the EROS collaborations, and we present a joint analysis of the OGLE-II and the OGLE-III campaigns.