Dark Matter and General Relativistic Instability in Supermassive Stars

TL;DR

This paper investigates how collisionless dark matter influences the stability of supermassive stars, revealing that even a small dark matter fraction can significantly alter the conditions for gravitational collapse.

Contribution

It provides the first detailed analysis of dark matter's impact on supermassive star stability and the onset of relativistic instability.

Findings

Dark matter content >1% can delay relativistic instability

Dark matter affects the critical density for collapse

Implications for nuclear burning and neutrino losses

Abstract

We calculate the extent to which collisionless dark matter impacts the stability of supermassive stars $(M\gtrsim10^4\,M_\odot)$. We find that, depending on the star's mass, a dark matter content in excess of ${\sim}1\%$ by mass throughout the entire star can raise the critical central density for the onset general relativistic instability, in some cases by orders of magnitude. We consider implications of this effect for the onset of nuclear burning and significant neutrino energy losses.