Constraints on the dark matter particle mass from the number of Milky Way satellites

Journal Article · Tue Feb 15 00:00:00 EST 2011 · Physical Review. D, Particles Fields

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PHYSREVD.83.043506· OSTI ID:21504958

Polisensky, Emil ^[1]; Ricotti, Massimo ^[2]

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1. Naval Research Laboratory, Washington, D.C. 20375 (United States)
2. Department of Astronomy, University of Maryland, College Park, Maryland 20745 (United States)

We have conducted N-body simulations of the growth of Milky Way-sized halos in cold and warm dark matter cosmologies. The number of dark matter satellites in our simulated Milky Ways decreases with decreasing mass of the dark matter particle. Assuming that the number of dark matter satellites exceeds or equals the number of observed satellites of the Milky Way, we derive lower limits on the dark matter particle mass. We find with 95% confidence m{sub s}>13.3 keV for a sterile neutrino produced by the Dodelson and Widrow mechanism, m{sub s}>8.9 keV for the Shi and Fuller mechanism, m{sub s}>3.0 keV for the Higgs decay mechanism, and m{sub WDM}>2.3 keV for a thermal dark matter particle. The recent discovery of many new dark matter dominated satellites of the Milky Way in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey allows us to set lower limits comparable to constraints from the complementary methods of Lyman-{alpha} forest modeling and x-ray observations of the unresolved cosmic x-ray background and of dark matter halos from dwarf galaxy to cluster scales. Future surveys like LSST, DES, PanSTARRS, and SkyMapper have the potential to discover many more satellites and further improve constraints on the dark matter particle mass.

• OSTI ID: 21504958
• Journal Information: Physical Review. D, Particles Fields, Vol. 83, Issue 4; Other Information: DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevD.83.043506; (c) 2011 American Institute of Physics; ISSN 0556-2821
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

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