Stringent neutrino flux constraints on antiquark nugget dark matter

Abstract

Strongly-interacting matter in the form of nuggets of nuclear-density material are not currently excluded as dark matter candidates in the ten gram to hundred kiloton mass range. A recent variation on quark nugget dark matter models postulates that a first-order imbalance between matter and antimatter in the quark-gluon plasma prior to hadron production in the early universe binds up most of the dark matter into heavy (baryon number B ∼ 10 25 ) anti-quark nuggets in the current epoch, explaining both the dark matter preponderance and the matter-antimatter asymmetry. Interactions of these massive objects with normal matter in the Earth and Sun will lead to annihilation and an associated neutrino flux in the ∼ 20 − 50 MeV range. We calculate these fluxes for anti-quark nuggets of sufficient number density to account for the dark matter and find that current neutrino flux limits from Super-Kamiokande provide stringent constraints on several possible scenarios for such objects. Conventional anti-quark nuggets in the previously allowed mass range cannot account for more than ∼ 1/5 of the dark matter flux; if they are in a color-superconducting phase, then their muon production during matter annihilation must be suppressed by an order of magnitude below prior estimates if they are to remain viable dark matter candidates.

Solar Extreme UV radiation and quark nugget dark matter model

“…In particular, the Nambu-Goldstone bosons in CS phase are 5-10 times lighter than their counterparts (such as conventional π mesons) in the hadronic phase. This observation leads to the profound consequences as the neutrino spectrum is expected to be in the 10 MeV range, in contrast with the 50 MeV scale associated with conventional hadronic decays as used in the analysis of [39]. Therefore, the quark nugget dark matter model is fully consistent with present neutrino flux measurements as stringent constraints from SuperK are not sensitive to the low energy neutrinos in the 10 MeV range [40].…”

“…The basic claim of ref. [39] is as follows: if one assumes that the neutrino spectrum (as a result of annihilation of anti nuggets with matter in Sun) is similar to the spectrum observed in studies of low -energy pp annihilation, then anti-quark nuggets cannot account for more than 1/5 of the dark matter flux.…”

“…6 We note that the complications related to a precise annihilation pattern (including the ionization of the nuggets and consequently, the complications related to the dynamics of the nuggets in the magnetic field) were absolutely irrelevant for analysis in refs. [39,40] because the neutrinos will leave the system irrespectively of the precise altitude where annihilation event occurs. This is not the case with EUV radiation which can only leave the system if annihilation occurs above (or slightly below) the photosphere.…”

DAMA/LIBRA annual modulation and axion quark nugget dark matter model

“…The main goal of ref. [50] was to argue that the Super-Kamiokande stringent constraint on anti-neutrino flux Φν e < (1.4 − 1.9)cm −2 s −1 at large energies E > 19.3 MeV [59] (which played the key role in analysis of [55]) does not apply to our case on neutrino and antineutrino production by AQNs because the typical energies of neutrinos and antineutrinos will be much lower.…”

“…[50] regarding the neutrinos emitted by AQNs captured by the Sun. The paper [50] was written in response to the claim made in [55] that dark matter in the form of AQNs cannot account for more than 20% of the dark matter density. This claim was based on constraints on the neutrino flux in the (20-50) MeV range where the sensitivity of underground neutrino detectors such as Super-Kamiokande have their highest signal-to-noise ratio.…”