Reconstructing WIMP properties through an interplay of signal measurements in direct detection, Fermi-LAT, and CTA searches for dark matter

TL;DR

This paper evaluates how combining data from direct detection experiments, Fermi-LAT, and CTA can improve the reconstruction of WIMP dark matter properties across different mass ranges and annihilation channels.

Contribution

It provides a comprehensive analysis of the complementarity of multiple detection methods for reconstructing WIMP properties over a wide mass spectrum.

Findings

Direct detection can accurately determine WIMP mass below 100 GeV.

Combining indirect and direct detection improves parameter constraints in the 100 GeV to a few hundred GeV range.

CTA can precisely reconstruct properties of TeV-scale WIMPs, especially for leptonic final states.

Abstract

We examine the projected ability to reconstruct the mass, scattering, and annihilation cross section of dark matter in the new generation of large underground detectors, XENON-1T, SuperCDMS, and DarkSide-G2, in combination with diffuse gamma radiation from expected 15 years of data from Fermi-LAT observation of 46 local spiral dwarf galaxies and projected CTA sensitivity to a signal from the Galactic Center. To this end we consider several benchmark points spanning a wide range of WIMP mass, different annihilation final states, and large enough event rates to warrant detection in one or more experiments. As previously shown, below some 100 GeV only direct detection experiments will in principle be able to reconstruct the WIMP mass well. This may, in case a signal at Fermi-LAT is also detected, additionally help restricting \sigma v and the allowed decay branching rates. In the intermediate range between some 100 GeV and up a few hundred GeV, direct and indirect detection experiments can be used in complementarity to ameliorate the respective determinations, which in individual experiments can at best be rather poor, thus making the WIMP reconstruction in this mass range very challenging. At large WIMP mass, ~1 TeV, CTA will have the ability to reconstruct mass, annihilation cross section, and the allowed decay branching rates to very good precision for the $\tau^+\tau^-$ or purely leptonic final state, good for the $W^+W^-$ case, and rather poor for $b\bar{b}$. A substantial improvement can potentially be achieved by reducing the systematic uncertainties, increasing exposure, or by an additional measurement at Fermi-LAT that would help reconstruct the annihilation cross section and the allowed branching fractions to different final states.