scholarly journals Near-Gaussian distributions for modelling discrete stellar velocity data with heteroskedastic uncertainties

2020 ◽  
Vol 499 (4) ◽  
pp. 5806-5825
Author(s):  
Jason L Sanders ◽  
N Wyn Evans

ABSTRACT The velocity distributions of stellar tracers in general exhibit weak non-Gaussianity encoding information on the orbital composition of a galaxy and the underlying potential. The standard solution for measuring non-Gaussianity involves constructing a series expansion (e.g. the Gauss–Hermite series) that can produce regions of negative probability density. This is a significant issue for the modelling of discrete data with heteroskedastic uncertainties. Here, we introduce a method to construct positive-definite probability distributions by the convolution of a given kernel with a Gaussian distribution. Further convolutions by observational uncertainties are trivial. The statistics (moments and cumulants) of the resulting distributions are governed by the kernel distribution. Two kernels (uniform and Laplace) offer simple drop-in replacements for a Gauss–Hermite series for negative and positive excess kurtosis distributions with the option of skewness. We demonstrate the power of our method by an application to real and mock line-of-sight velocity data sets on dwarf spheroidal galaxies, where kurtosis is indicative of orbital anisotropy and hence a route to breaking the mass–anisotropy degeneracy for the identification of cusped versus cored dark matter profiles. Data on the Fornax dwarf spheroidal galaxy indicate positive excess kurtosis and hence favour a cored dark matter profile. Although designed for discrete data, the analytic Fourier transforms of the new models also make them appropriate for spectral fitting, which could improve the fits of high-quality data by avoiding unphysical negative wings in the line-of-sight velocity distribution.

Author(s):  
Alexandres Lazar ◽  
James S Bullock ◽  
Michael Boylan-Kolchin ◽  
Robert Feldmann ◽  
Onur Çatmabacak ◽  
...  

Abstract A promising route for revealing the existence of dark matter structures on mass scales smaller than the faintest galaxies is through their effect on strong gravitational lenses. We examine the role of local, lens-proximate clustering in boosting the lensing probability relative to contributions from substructure and unclustered line-of-sight (LOS) haloes. Using two cosmological simulations that can resolve halo masses of Mhalo ≃ 109 M⊙ (in a simulation box of length Lbox ∼ 100 Mpc) and 107 M⊙ (Lbox ∼ 20 Mpc), we demonstrate that clustering in the vicinity of the lens host produces a clear enhancement relative to an assumption of unclustered haloes that persists to >20 Rvir. This enhancement exceeds estimates that use a two-halo term to account for clustering, particularly within 2 − 5 Rvir. We provide an analytic expression for this excess, clustered contribution. We find that local clustering boosts the expected count of 109 M⊙ perturbing haloes by ${\sim }35{{\ \rm per\ cent}}$ compared to substructure alone, a result that will significantly enhance expected signals for low-redshift (zl ≃ 0.2) lenses, where substructure contributes substantially compared to LOS haloes. We also find that the orientation of the lens with respect to the line of sight (e.g. whether the line of sight passes through the major axis of the lens) can also have a significant effect on the lensing signal, boosting counts by an additional $\sim 50{{\ \rm per\ cent}}$ compared to a random orientations. This could be important if discovered lenses are biased to be oriented along their principal axis.


2013 ◽  
Vol 9 (S298) ◽  
pp. 411-411
Author(s):  
Kohei Hayashi ◽  
Masashi Chiba

AbstractWe construct axisymmetric mass models for dwarf spheroidal (dSph) galaxies in the Milky Way to obtain realistic limits on the non-spherical structure of their dark halos. This is motivated by the fact that the observed luminous parts of the dSphs are actually non-spherical and cold dark matter models predict non-spherical virialized dark halos on sub-galactic scales. Applying these models to line-of-sight velocity dispersion profiles along three position angles in six Galactic satellites, we find that the best fitting cases for most of the dSphs yield not spherical but oblate and flattened dark halos. We also find that the mass of the dSphs enclosed within inner 300 pc varies depending on their total luminosities, contrary to the conclusion of previous spherical models. This suggests the importance of considering non-spherical shapes of dark halos in dSph mass models.


2007 ◽  
Vol 36 (3) ◽  
pp. 453-463 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. Rodríguez-Avi ◽  
A. Conde-Sánchez ◽  
A. J. Sáez-Castillo ◽  
M. J. Olmo-Jiménez

2018 ◽  
Vol 98 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sebastian Bergström ◽  
Riccardo Catena ◽  
Andrea Chiappo ◽  
Jan Conrad ◽  
Björn Eurenius ◽  
...  

2021 ◽  
Vol 502 (3) ◽  
pp. 4039-4047
Author(s):  
Charles Thorpe-Morgan ◽  
Denys Malyshev ◽  
Christoph-Alexander Stegen ◽  
Andrea Santangelo ◽  
Josef Jochum

ABSTRACT Galaxy clusters are the largest virialized objects in the Universe and, as such, have high dark matter (DM) concentrations. This abundance of dark matter makes them promising targets for indirect DM searches. Here we report the details of a search, utilizing almost 12 yr of Fermi/LAT data, for gamma-ray signatures from the pair annihilation of WIMP dark matter in the GeV energy band. From this, we present the constraints on the annihilation cross-section for the $b\overline{b}$, W+W−, and γγ channels, derived from the non-detection of a characteristic signal from five nearby, high Galactic latitude, galaxy clusters (Centaurus, Coma, Virgo, Perseus, and Fornax). We discuss the potential of a boost to the signal due to the presence of substructures in the DM haloes of selected objects, as well as the impact of uncertainties in DM profiles on the presented results. We assert that the obtained limits are, within a small factor, comparable to the best available limits of those based on Fermi/LAT observations of dwarf spheroidal galaxies.


2017 ◽  
Vol 468 (2) ◽  
pp. 1338-1348 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shu-Rong Chen ◽  
Hsi-Yu Schive ◽  
Tzihong Chiueh

2019 ◽  
Vol 487 (4) ◽  
pp. 5711-5720 ◽  
Author(s):  
D Savchenko ◽  
A Rudakovskyi

ABSTRACTDwarf spheroidal galaxies (dSphs) are the most compact dark-matter-dominated objects observed so far. The Pauli exclusion principle limits the number of fermionic dark matter particles that can compose a dSph halo. This results in a well-known lower bound on their particle mass. So far, such bounds were obtained from the analysis of individual dSphs. In this paper, we model dark matter halo density profiles via the semi-analytical approach and analyse the data from eight ‘classical’ dSphs assuming the same mass of dark matter fermion in each object. First, we find out that modelling of Carina dSph results in a much worse fitting quality compared to the other seven objects. From the combined analysis of the kinematic data of the remaining seven ‘classical’ dSphs, we obtain a new 2σ lower bound of m ≳ 190 eV on the dark matter fermion mass. In addition, by combining a sub-sample of four dSphs – Draco, Fornax, Leo I, and Sculptor – we conclude that 220 eV fermionic dark matter appears to be preferred over the standard cold dark matter at about the 2σ level. However, this result becomes insignificant if all seven objects are included in the analysis. Future improvement of the obtained bound requires more detailed data, both from ‘classical’ and ultra-faint dSphs.


Galaxies ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 7 (4) ◽  
pp. 90 ◽  
Author(s):  
Francesca Calore ◽  
Moritz Hütten ◽  
Martin Stref

Searches for “dark” subhaloes in gamma-ray point-like source catalogues are among promising strategies for indirect dark matter detection. Such a search is nevertheless affected by uncertainties related, on the one hand, to the modelling of the dark matter subhalo distribution in Milky-Way-like galaxies, and, on the other hand, to the sensitivity of gamma-ray instruments to the dark matter subhalo signals. In the present work, we assess the detectability of dark matter subhaloes in Fermi-LAT catalogues, taking into accounts uncertainties associated with the modelling of the galactic subhalo population. We use four different halo models bracketing a large set of uncertainties. For each model, adopting an accurate detection threshold of the LAT to dark matter subhalo signals and comparing model predictions with the number of unassociated point-sources in Fermi-LAT catalogues, we derive upper limits on the annihilation cross section as a function of dark matter mass. Our results show that, even in the best-case scenario (i.e., DMonly subhalo model), which does not include tidal disruption from baryons, the limits on the dark matter parameter space are less stringent than current gamma-ray limits from dwarf spheroidal galaxies. Comparing the results obtained with the different subhalo models, we find that baryonic effects on the subhalo population are significant and lead to dark matter constraints that are less stringent by a factor of ∼2 to ∼5. This uncertainty comes from the unknown resilience of dark matter subhaloes to tidal disruption.


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