Comment on "Dark matter searches going bananas: the contribution of Potassium (and Chlorine) to the 3.5 keV line"

TL;DR

This paper critiques a recent claim that potassium and chlorine lines explain an unidentified 3.5 keV emission line, highlighting errors in atomic data and modeling in the original analysis.

Contribution

It provides corrected atomic data and clarifies spectroscopic modeling issues, challenging previous interpretations of the 3.5 keV line.

Findings

Incorrect atomic data used in previous analysis

Corrected atomic data provided from AtomDB

Reassessment of the 3.5 keV line origin

Abstract

The recent paper by Jeltema & Profumo(2014) claims that contributions from \ion{K}{18} and \ion{Cl}{17} lines can explain the unidentified emission line found by Bulbul et al 2014 and also by Boyarsky et al, 2014a, 2014b. We show that their analysis relies upon incorrect atomic data and inconsistent spectroscopic modeling. We address these points and summarize in the appendix the correct values for the relevant atomic data from AtomDB.