2007/05/31 by Gregory D. Mack, J. F. Beacom, John F. Beacom +1 · 18 citations
Physics and Astronomy · #Cosmology and Gravitation Theories #Dark Matter and Cosmic Phenomena #Particle physics theoretical and experimental studies #astro-ph #hep-ph #nucl-th
paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physrevd.76.043523
published as Phys.Rev.D76:043523,2007 · 12 pages, 2 figures; minor updates to match published version
openalex publication_date 2007/08/28 · arxiv created 2007/10/12 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/01
We point out a new and largely model-independent constraint on the dark matter scattering cross section with nucleons, which applies when this quantity is larger than for typical weakly interacting dark matter candidates. When the dark matter capture rate in Earth is efficient, the rate of energy deposition by dark matter self-annihilation products would grossly exceed the measured heat flow of Earth. This improves the spin-independent cross section constraints by many orders of magnitude and closes the window between astrophysical constraints (at very large cross sections) and underground detector constraints (at small cross sections). In the applicable mass range, from \ensuremath∼1 to \ensuremath∼1010 GeV, the scattering cross section of dark matter with nucleons is then bounded from above by the latter constraints and hence must be truly weak, as usually assumed.