DAMA annual modulation from electron recoils

TL;DR

This paper investigates plasma dark matter models to explain DAMA's annual modulation signal from electron recoils, comparing model predictions with recent experimental data and constraints from other detectors.

Contribution

It introduces a simple phenomenological model for dark matter velocity distribution and evaluates its compatibility with DAMA/LIBRA phase 2 data and other experimental constraints.

Findings

Model predicts annual modulation consistent with DAMA data.

Constraints from XENON100 and DarkSide-50 limit parameter space.

Plasma dark matter scenario remains a viable explanation for DAMA signals.

Abstract

Plasma dark matter, which arises in dissipative dark matter models, can give rise to large annual modulation signals from keV electron recoils. Previous work has argued that the DAMA annual modulation signal could have an explanation within such a scenario. However, detailed predictions are difficult due to the inherent complexities involved in modelling the halo plasma interactions with Earth-bound dark matter. Here, we consider a simple phenomenological model for the dark matter velocity function relevant for direct detection experiments, and compare the resulting electron scattering rate with the new DAMA/LIBRA phase 2 data. We also consider the constraints from other experiments, including XENON100 and DarkSide-50.