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arXiv · 1504.06576

On the interpretation of dark matter self-interactions in Abell 3827

Felix Kahlhoefer·Kai Schmidt-Hoberg·Janis Kummer·Subir Sarkar
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Abstract

Self-interactions of dark matter particles can potentially lead to an observable separation between the dark matter halo and the stars of a galaxy moving through a region of large dark matter density. Such a separation has recently been observed in a galaxy falling into the core of the galaxy cluster Abell 3827. We estimated the DM self-interaction cross section needed to reproduce the observed effects and find that the sensitivity of Abell 3827 has been significantly overestimated in a previous study. Our corrected estimate is $\tilde{\sigma}/m_\text{DM} \sim 3\:\text{cm}^2\:\text{g}^{-1}$ when self-interactions result in an effective drag force and $\sigma/m_\text{DM} \sim 1.5\:\text{cm}^2\:\text{g}^{-1}$ for the case of contact interactions, in some tension with previous upper bounds.

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Felix Kahlhoefer, Kai Schmidt-Hoberg, Janis Kummer, Subir Sarkar. 2015-04-24. On the interpretation of dark matter self-interactions in Abell 3827. https://doi.org/10.1093/mnrasl/slv088

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