Attenuation of Cosmic-Ray Up-Scattered Dark Matter

TL;DR

This paper investigates how cosmic-ray interactions can detect strongly interacting GeV-scale dark matter that is otherwise hidden from underground detectors, emphasizing the importance of nuclear effects and mediators.

Contribution

It provides a detailed analysis of cosmic-ray boosted dark matter detection, including nuclear form factors, inelastic scattering, and mediator effects, refining previous bounds.

Findings

Nuclear form factors significantly affect detection prospects.

Inelastic scattering alters the expected dark matter flux.

Light mediators can open or close detection windows.

Abstract

GeV-scale dark matter particles with strong coupling to baryons evade the standard direct detection limits as they are efficiently stopped in the overburden and, consequently, are not able to reach the underground detectors. On the other hand, it has been shown that it is possible to probe this parameter space taking into account the flux of dark matter particles boosted by interactions with cosmic rays. We revisit these bounds paying particular attention to interactions of the relativistic dark matter particles in the Earth's crust. The effects of nuclear form factors, inelastic scattering and extra dependence of the cross section on transferred momentum (e.g., due to presence of light mediators) are studied and are found to be crucial for answering the question as to whether the window for GeV-scale strongly interacting dark matter is closed or not.