Strong gravitational radiation from a simple dark matter model

TL;DR

This paper investigates the potential for future gravitational wave detectors to observe signals from phase transitions in a simple dark matter model involving an $SU(2)_D$ gauge symmetry, especially in the super-cool regime with heavy dark matter.

Contribution

It demonstrates that gravitational waves from dark matter phase transitions can be detectable, with a focus on a minimal $SU(2)_D$ model and the super-cool regime, including astrophysical foreground effects.

Findings

Strong gravitational wave signals are predicted for super-cool dark matter with masses above 100 TeV.

Future observatories like LISA and Einstein Telescope could detect these signals.

Astrophysical foregrounds significantly impact the detectability analysis.

Abstract

A rather minimal possibility is that dark matter consists of the gauge bosons of a spontaneously broken symmetry. Here we explore the possibility of detecting the gravitational waves produced by the phase transition associated with such breaking. Concretely, we focus on the scenario based on an $SU(2)_D$ group and argue that it is a case study for the sensitivity of future gravitational wave observatories to phase transitions associated with dark matter. This is because there are few parameters and those fixing the relic density also determine the effective potential establishing the strength of the phase transition. Particularly promising for LISA and even the Einstein Telescope is the super-cool dark matter regime, with DM masses above $\mathcal{O}$(100) TeV, for which we find that the gravitational wave signal is notably strong. In our analysis, we include the effect of astrophysical foregrounds, which are often ignored in the context of phase transitions.