Constrain the Dark Matter Electron Cross Section from Pulsating White Dwarfs

TL;DR

This paper proposes using pulsating white dwarfs in globular clusters to detect dark matter-electron interactions by analyzing their pulsation period variations, offering a novel astrophysical approach to constrain dark matter properties.

Contribution

It introduces a new method leveraging asteroseismology of white dwarfs to constrain dark matter-electron cross sections, which is feasible with upcoming precise photometry.

Findings

The method can constrain DM-electron cross sections for DM masses above 5 GeV.

Estimations show the approach is feasible with near-future time-series photometry.

The energy from DM annihilation affects white dwarf cooling and pulsation periods.

Abstract

We propose a novel and feasible method to detect dark matter (DM) electron interaction via pulsating white dwarfs (WDs) in the central region of globular clusters. Annihilation of the DM particles captured by those WDs can provide additional energy source along the natural cooling evolution of WDs and the cooling print can be well offered by precise asteroseismology. The measurement of the long time scale physical quantity -- the rates of period variation of pulsation modes -- could be used to constrain the cross section between DM particles and electrons ($\sigma_{e}$), when DM particle mass $m_{\chi} \gtrsim 5 \mathrm{GeV}$. We construct estimations to prove that this original method is feasible and can be implemented in the challenging time-series photometry in the near future.