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  • Acharyya, A; Archer, A; Bangale, P; Bartkoske, J T; Batista, P; Baumgart, M; Benbow, W; Buckley, J H; Falcone, A; Feng, Q; Finley, J P; Foote, G M; tson, L; Furniss, A; Gallagher, G; Hanlon, W F; Hervet, O; Hoang, J; Holder, J; Humensky, T B; Jin, W; Kaaret, P; Kertzman, M; Kherlakian, M; Kieda, D; Kleiner, T K; Korzoun, N; Krennrich, F; Lang, M J; Lundy, M; Maier, G; McGrath, C E; Moriarty, P; O'Brien, S; Ong, R A; Pfrang, K; Pohl, M; Pueschel, E; Quinn, J; Ragan, K; Reynolds, P T; Roache, E; Rodd, N L; Ryan, J L; Sadeh, I; Saha, L; Santander, M; Sembroski, G H; Shang, R; Splettstoesser, M; Tak, D; Tucci, J V; Vassiliev, V V; Williams, D A

    arXiv (Cornell University), 02/2023
    Paper, Journal Article

    Dark matter is a key piece of the current cosmological scenario, with weakly interacting massive particles (WIMPs) a leading dark matter candidate. WIMPs have not been detected in their conventional parameter space (100 GeV \(\lesssim M_{\chi} \lesssim\) 100 TeV), a mass range accessible with current Imaging Atmospheric Cherenkov Telescopes. As ultraheavy dark matter (UHDM; \(M_{\chi} \gtrsim\) 100 TeV) has been suggested as an under-explored alternative to the WIMP paradigm, we search for an indirect dark matter annihilation signal in a higher mass range (up to 30 PeV) with the VERITAS gamma-ray observatory. With 216 hours of observations of four dwarf spheroidal galaxies, we perform an unbinned likelihood analysis. We find no evidence of a \(\gamma\)-ray signal from UHDM annihilation above the background fluctuation for any individual dwarf galaxy nor for a joint-fit analysis, and consequently constrain the velocity-weighted annihilation cross section of UHDM for dark matter particle masses between 1 TeV and 30 PeV. We additionally set constraints on the allowed radius of a composite UHDM particle.