Probing the Inert Doublet Dark Matter with Stellar-Mass Black Hole Mini-Spikes

TL;DR

This paper explores how dark matter mini-spikes around stellar-mass black holes can be used to constrain the Inert Doublet Model, revealing significant parameter space restrictions through gamma-ray observations.

Contribution

It introduces a novel indirect detection method using stellar-mass black hole mini-spikes to probe the IDM parameter space, especially at high masses.

Findings

Constraints extend into the multi-TeV range for IDM.

Dark matter annihilation signals are significantly enhanced near black holes.

Stellar-mass black hole mini-spikes are sensitive probes of dark matter interactions.

Abstract

The nature of dark matter remains a central unresolved problem in contemporary physics, motivating the exploration of well-defined extensions of the Standard Model. Among these, the Inert Doublet Model provides a minimal and theoretically consistent framework accommodating a viable weakly interacting massive particle dark matter candidate. In this work, we investigate the IDM parameter space through an analysis of FermiLAT observations of dark matter mini-spikes surrounding stellar-mass black holes. Owing to the strong gravitational compression of dark matter in the vicinity of these systems, the resulting annihilation signal can be significantly enhanced, rendering such environments exceptionally sensitive probes of dark matter interactions. We find that substantial regions of the IDM parameter space, particularly in the high-mass regime, are subject to stringent constraints extending into the multi-TeV range. These results underscore the increasingly important role of indirect detection in probing particle dark matter scenarios beyond the reach of current collider and direct detection experiments.