Very weakly interacting slim particles (WISPs), such as axion-like particles (ALPs) or hidden photons (HPs), may be non-thermally produced via the misalignment mechanism in the early universe and survive as a cold dark matter population until today. We find that, both for ALPs and HPs whose dominant interactions with the standard model arise from couplings to photons, a huge region in the parameter spaces spanned by photon coupling and ALP or HP mass can give rise to the observed cold dark matter. Remarkably, a large region of this parameter space coincides with that predicted in well motivated models of fundamental physics. A wide range of experimental searches -exploiting haloscopes (direct dark matter searches exploiting microwave cavities), helioscopes (searches for solar ALPs or HPs), or light-shining-through-a-wall techniques -can probe large parts of this parameter space in the foreseeable future.

Abstract. We review the cosmological implications of a relic population of pseudo NambuGoldstone bosons (pNGB) with an anomalous coupling to two photons, often called axion-like particles (ALPs). We establish constraints on the pNGB mass and two-photon coupling by considering big bang nucleosynthesis, the physics of the cosmic microwave background, and the diffuse photon background. The bounds from WMAP7 and other large-scale-structure data on the effective number of neutrino species can be stronger than the traditional bounds from the primordial helium abundance. These bounds, together with those from primordial deuterium abundance, constitute the most stringent probes of early decays.

Abstract. Axions with mass m a > ∼ 0.7 eV are excluded by cosmological precision data because they provide too much hot dark matter. While for m a > ∼ 20 eV the a → 2γ lifetime drops below the age of the universe, we show that the cosmological exclusion range can be extended to 0.7 eV < ∼ m a < ∼ 300 keV, primarily by the cosmic deuterium abundance: axion decays would strongly modify the baryon-to-photon ratio at BBN relative to the one at CMB decoupling. Additional arguments include neutrino dilution relative to photons by axion decays and spectral CMB distortions. Our new cosmological constraints complement stellar-evolution and laboratory bounds.

A brief account of the phenomenon of photon oscillations into sub-eV mass hidden photons is given and used to estimate the flux and properties of these hypothetical particles from the Sun. A new generation of dedicated helioscopes, the Solar Hidden Photon Search (SHIPS) in the Hamburg Observatory amongst them, will cover a vast region of parameter space.

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