Multiyear search for dark matter annihilations in the Sun with the AMANDA-II and IceCube detectors

Abstract

A search for an excess of muon-neutrinos from dark matter annihilations in the Sun has been performed with the AMANDA-II neutrino telescope using data collected in 812 days of livetime between 2001 and 2006 and 149 days of livetime collected with the AMANDA-II and the 40-string configuration of IceCube during 2008 and early 2009. No excess over the expected atmospheric neutrino background has been observed. We combine these results with the previously published IceCube limits obtained with data taken during 2007 to obtain a total livetime of 1065 days. We provide an upper limit at 90% confidence level on the annihilation rate of captured neutralinos in the Sun, as well as the corresponding muon flux limit at the Earth, both as functions of the neutralino mass in the range 50 GeV-5000 GeV. We also derive a limit on the neutralino-proton spin-dependent and spin-independent cross section. The limits presented here improve the previous results obtained by the collaboration between a factor of two and five, as well as extending the neutralino masses probed down to 50 GeV. The spin-dependent cross section limits are the most stringent so far for neutralino masses above 200 GeV, and well below direct search results in the mass range from 50 GeV to 5 TeV.

Enhanced diphoton rates at Fermi and the LHC

“…Further constraints on the model arise from the neutrino searches by Super-Kamiokande [70,71] and IceCube [72] which aim to detect the annihilation of dark matter particles in the sun. They provide especially strong bounds on the spin-dependent cross section 70] if the LSPs dominantly annihilate into W bosons.…”

How light a higgsino or a wino dark matter can become in a compressed scenario of MSSM

“…On the other hand, the DM indirect detection experiments [147,148] look for signals coming from stable final state particles of DM annihilation processes in the solar or galactic cores. Since the sfermion-coannihilations make the smaller DM mass zones to become valid in relation to the relic density data, it is important to find whether the indirect detection rates can also be large for much smaller values of higgsino or wino masses satisfying the DM relic density limits.…”

Advancing the Search for Dark Matter: from CDMS II to SuperCDMS

“…The stars of our galaxy reside within a much larger, more massive halo of dark matter (with local density 0.3±0.1 GeV/cm 3 [30]). …”

“…Big-bang Nucleosynthesis (or BBN) is a theory of how light nuclei (D, 3 He, 4 He, and 7 Li) are formed in the hot dense early universe. The amount of these nuclei present in the current universe places tight constraints on the duration of this nucleosynthesis epoch, in turn placing tight constraints on the universe's expansion history and mass.…”

“…In the bottom frame, this fraction has been normalized by the electron recoil case, as is the CDMS convention. of electronic stopping power fails when electronic stopping reaches a maximum near v r (e2/h)Z2/ 3 . This velocity corresponds to E r10i 3 (or higher) and occurs at energies well above the range interesting for dark matter.…”