Stochastic lensing of stars by ultralight dark matter halos

TL;DR

This paper investigates how oscillating granular patterns in ultralight dark matter halos can cause a time-varying lensing effect on stars, offering a potential observational method to constrain dark matter properties.

Contribution

It provides a detailed analysis of the stochastic lensing signal caused by ultralight dark matter density fluctuations, including the impact of granules and the central soliton.

Findings

Calculated the amplitude and temporal characteristics of the lensing signal.

Estimated the potential of stellar observations to constrain dark matter parameters.

Analyzed the effects of density granules and the soliton on lensing signals.

Abstract

Ultralight dark matter is an interesting dark matter candidate describing the lightest end of the mass parameter space. This model produces an oscillating granular pattern in halo densities. These fluctuations have the potential to produce a time-varying density along the line of sight creating a small lensing signal for any stars observed through a dark matter halo which oscillates on the de Broglie timescale. In this work, we study this stochastic lensing signal taking into account the impact of density granules as well as the central soliton. We calculate the amplitude and temporal properties of this signal and estimate how stellar observations may be used to constrain the ultralight dark matter mass and abundance.