Dark matter heating in old isolated neutron stars

by Motoko Fujiwara (Nagoya University)

Tuesday 23 Apr 2024, 10:00 → 12:00 Europe/Vienna

meeting room (PSK)

Old isolated neutron stars have been gathering attention as targets to probe Dark Matter (DM) through temperature observations. 

DM will anomalously heat neutron stars through its gravitational capture and annihilation process, which predicts (1-3)*10^3 K even for older neutron stars than 10^6 years.  We may constrain DM-nucleon scattering cross section by finding even colder neutron stars than this prediction. Since we have a very different kinematical setup around neutron stars, one can probe DM theoretical parameter space complementary to terrestrial experiments such as DM direct detection. In this talk, we review recent progress in this DM search direction including the sensitivity study on DM scattering at neutron stars and future opportunities to probe old isolated neutron stars. Lastly, we will discuss internal heating mechanisms of neutron stars and their quantitative relevance against DM heating effects. 

 

240423-Motoko_Fujiwara.pdf