The sensitivity of Cherenkov telescopes to dark matter and astrophysical anisotropies in the diffuse gamma-ray background
- The Oskar Klein Centre for Cosmo Particle Physics, AlbaNova, SE-106 91 Stockholm (Sweden)
- Department of Physics, University of Torino, via P. Giuria 1, 10125 Torino (Italy)
- University of Hamburg, Institut für Experimentalphysik, Luruper Chaussee 149, D-22761 Hamburg (Germany)
In this article, the capability of present (H.E.S.S., MAGIC, VERITAS) and planned (CTA) ground-based Cherenkov telescope systems for detecting angular anisotropies in the diffuse gamma-ray background is investigated. Following up on a study of the impact of instrumental characteristics (effective area, field of view, angular resolution, and background rejection efficiency), the first part examines the influence of different observational strategies, i.e. whether a single deep observation or a splitting over multiple shallow fields is preferred. In the second part, the sensitivity to anisotropies generated by self-annihilating dark matter is studied for different common dark matter models. We find that a relative contribution of ∼ 10% from dark matter annihilation to the extra-galactic diffuse gamma-ray background can be detected with planned configurations of CTA. In terms of the thermally-averaged self-annihilation cross section, the sensitivity of CTA corresponds to values below the thermal freeze-out expectation (σv) = 3 × 10{sup −26} cm{sup 3} s{sup −1} for dark matter particles lighter than ∼ 200 GeV. We stress the importance of constraining anisotropies from unresolved astrophysical sources with currently operating instruments already, as a novel and complementary method for investigating the properties of TeV sources.
- OSTI ID:
- 22369791
- Journal Information:
- Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics, Vol. 2014, Issue 01; Other Information: Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); ISSN 1475-7516
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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