Theory Group Seminar, 26 May 2009
Daniel Stolarski, University of California, Berkeley
Dark Matter Signals From Cascade Annihilations
abstract
New data from various experiments including PAMELA, ATIC, HESS, and Fermi indicate that there is an anomalous flux of high energy electrons and positrons coming from space. While these particles could be due to astrophysical sources, they may also be the result of dark matter. In this talk, I will review the experimental findings and analyze them in the context of dark matter annihilation. I will focus on models where dark matter annihilates through a series of lighter particles which eventually decay into Standard Model leptons. I will compare these models to the electron and positron data and also look at bounds from null results in searches for gamma rays and neutrinos.