Department of Physics & Astronomy
University of New Mexico

Nuclear, Particle, Astroparticle and Cosmology (NUPAC) Seminars

Nonthermal Dark Matter from Early Matter Domination

Presented by Jacek Osinski (UNM)

There is currently no observational probe of the era before Big Bang Nucleosynthesis (BBN), when the universe was less than 1 second old, but Dark Matter (DM) can provide a window on the properties of the universe at this early time. The traditional approach to DM production is the thermal freeze-out of WIMPs (Weakly Interacting Massive Particles), however this relies on an assumption of Radiation Domination throughout the period before BBN and is becoming increasingly constrained by observations. Nonthermal production can take many forms, all of which rely on their own assumptions, but allows for a greater variety in DM parameters not accessible through the standard WIMP scenario. In this talk, I will present two scenarios in which the entire observed abundance of DM is produced by nonthermal mechanisms involving an early matter dominated period: freeze-out/in of DM in the presence of two decaying heavy scalar fields; and a topological DM scenario involving hidden sector magnetic monopoles.

2:00 pm, Tuesday, October 30, 2018
PAIS-2540, PAIS

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