Detecting Asymmetric Dark Matter in the Sun with Neutrinos

TL;DR

This paper explores how combined neutrino telescope and direct detection data can identify or constrain asymmetric dark matter in the Sun, providing insights into its relic density and particle-antiparticle asymmetry.

Contribution

It demonstrates that current and future neutrino observations can effectively constrain or detect asymmetric dark matter in the Sun, linking neutrino fluxes to dark matter properties.

Findings

Current neutrino data constrains asymmetric DM unless asymmetry is below 1%

Future detectors can detect high-energy neutrinos from the Sun's center

Neutrino flux observations inform on DM-nucleus cross section and DM/anti-DM ratio

Abstract

Dark Matter (DM) may have a relic density that is in part determined by a particle/antiparticle asymmetry, much like baryons. If this is the case, it can accumulate in stars like the Sun to sizable number densities and annihilate to Standard Model (SM) particles including neutrinos. We show that the combination of neutrino telescope and direct detection data can be used in conjunction to determine or constrain the DM asymmetry from data. Depending on the DM mass, the current neutrino data from Super-K and IceCube give powerful constraints on asymmetric DM unless its fractional asymmetry is $\lesssim 10^{-2}$. Future neutrino telescopes and detectors like Hyper-K and KM3NeT can search for the resulting signal of high-energy neutrinos from the center of the Sun. The observation of such a flux yields information on both the DM-nucleus cross section but also on the relative abundances of DM and anti-DM.