A realistic assessment of the CTA sensitivity to dark matter annihilation

Journal Article · Sun Mar 01 04:00:00 EST 2015 · Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1088/1475-7516/2015/03/055· OSTI ID:22525918

Silverwood, Hamish; Weniger, Christoph; Bertone, Gianfranco ^[1]; Scott, Pat ^[2]

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1. GRAPPA, University of Amsterdam, Science Park 904, Amsterdam, 1098 XH The Netherlands (Netherlands)
2. Department of Physics, Imperial College London, Blackett Laboratory, Prince Consort Road, London, SW7 2AZ United Kingdom (United Kingdom)

We estimate the sensitivity of the upcoming CTA gamma-ray observatory to DM annihilation at the Galactic centre, improving on previous analyses in a number of significant ways. First, we perform a detailed analyses of all backgrounds, including diffuse astrophysical emission for the first time in a study of this type. Second, we present a statistical framework for including systematic errors and estimate the consequent degradation in sensitivity. These errors may come from e.g. event reconstruction, Monte Carlo determination of the effective area or uncertainty in atmospheric conditions. Third, we show that performing the analysis on a set of suitably optimised regions of interest makes it possible to partially compensate for the degradation in sensitivity caused by systematics and diffuse emission. To probe dark matter with the canonical thermal annihilation cross-section, CTA systematics like non-uniform variations in acceptance over a single field of view must be kept below the 0.3% level, unless the dark matter density rises more steeply in the centre of the Galaxy than predicted by a typical Navarro-Frenk-White or Einasto profile. For a contracted r{sup −1.3} profile, and systematics at the 1% level, CTA can probe annihilation to b b-bar at the canonical thermal level for dark matter masses between 100 GeV and 10 TeV.

• OSTI ID: 22525918
• Journal Information: Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics, Journal Name: Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics Journal Issue: 03 Vol. 2015; ISSN 1475-7516
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS
ANNIHILATION
ASTROPHYSICS
DENSITY
GALAXIES
GAMMA RADIATION
GEV RANGE
MASS
MILKY WAY
MONTE CARLO METHOD
NONLUMINOUS MATTER
PROBES
SENSITIVITY
TEV RANGE
VARIATIONS