A Model-independent Radio Telescope Dark Matter Search

Abstract

Abstract A novel search technique for ultralight dark matter has been developed and carried out over a narrow range in the L band, utilizing the recent Breakthrough Listen public data release of three years of observation with the Green Bank Telescope. The search concept depends only on the assumption of decay or annihilation of virialized dark matter to a quasimonochromatic radio line, and additionally that the frequency and intensity of the line be consistent with most general properties expected of the phase space of our Milky Way halo. Specifically, the search selects for a line that exhibits a Doppler shift with position according to the solar motion through a static Galactic halo and similarly varies in intensity with the position with respect to the Galactic center. Over the frequency range 1.73–1.83 GHz, radiative annihilation of dark matter is excluded above 〈σ v〉 = 1.2 × 10−47 cm3 s−1 and for decay above λ = 4.1 × 10−35 s−1. The analysis of the full Breakthrough Listen GBT data set by this method (25,000 spectra, 1.1-11.6 GHz) is currently underway.