Dark Stars Powered by Self-Interacting Dark Matter

Dark matter annihilation might power the first luminous stars in the Universe.
This type of stars, known as Dark Stars, could form in 10^6-10^8 solar mass protohalos at redshifts z around 20, and they could be much more luminous and larger in size than ordinary stars powered by nuclear fusion. We investigate the formation of Dark Stars in the self-interacting dark matter (SIDM) scenario.

We present a concrete particle physics model of SIDM that can simultaneously give rise to the observed dark matter density, satisfy constraints from astrophysical and terrestrial searches, and address the various small-scale problems of collisionless dark matter via the self-interactions.

In this model, the power from dark matter annihilation is deposited in the baryonic gas in environments where Dark Stars could form. We further study the evolution of SIDM density profiles in the protohalos at z around 20. As the baryon cloud collapses due to the various cooling processes, the deepening gravitational potential can speed up gravothermal evolution of the SIDM halo, yielding sufficiently high dark matter densities for Dark Stars to form. We find that SIDM-powered Dark Stars can have similar properties, such as their luminosity and size, as Dark Stars predicted in collisionless dark matter models.

Youjia Wu, Sebastian Baum, Katherine Freese, Luca Visinelli, Hai-Bo Yu

Comments: 11 pages, 4 figures
Subjects: High Energy Physics – Phenomenology (hep-ph); Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics (astro-ph.CO)
Report number: UTTG 12-2021; LCTP-21-18; NORDITA 2021-068
Cite as: arXiv:2205.10904 [hep-ph] (or arXiv:2205.10904v1 [hep-ph] for this version)
https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2205.10904
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Submission history
From: Youjia Wu
[v1] Sun, 22 May 2022 18:54:43 UTC (611 KB)
https://arxiv.org/abs/2205.10904