Impact of galactic distributions in celestial capture of dark matter

TL;DR

This paper investigates how different galactic dark matter velocity distributions, derived from observations and simulations, significantly influence the rate at which dark matter is captured by celestial objects, impacting dark matter detection strategies.

Contribution

It systematically analyzes the effects of various realistic dark matter velocity distributions on celestial capture rates, extending beyond standard models with insights from cosmological simulations.

Findings

Capture rate varies up to 20% within standard halo model.

Capture rate can increase up to 200% with empirical velocity profiles.

Cosmological simulations significantly influence dark matter capture estimates.

Abstract

Celestial capture of dark matter provides a useful handle for constraining its particulate properties. The capture formalism is sensitive to the phase space distribution of dark matter in the vicinity of the celestial object. This article aims to systematically study the impact of uncertainties and the influence of cosmological simulations on the rate at which dark matter particles are captured inside a variety of celestial objects. Going beyond the framework of the Maxwell-Boltzmann distribution or the standard halo model, we take up pragmatic dark matter velocity distributions motivated by observations or cosmological simulations. Within the limits of the standard halo model, we report a maximum $\sim 20\%$ change in the capture rate. This number can go up to $\sim 200\%$ if dark matter particles within the galactic halo are favored to have an empirical velocity distribution profile when well-resolved and sophisticated cosmological simulations are employed to extract their parametric values.