First Constraints on Fuzzy Dark Matter from Lyman-α Forest Data and Hydrodynamical Simulations

Vid Iršič, Matteo Viel, Martin G. Haehnelt, James S. Bolton, and George D. Becker
Phys. Rev. Lett. 119, 031302 – Published 20 July 2017
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Abstract

We present constraints on the masses of extremely light bosons dubbed fuzzy dark matter (FDM) from Lyman-α forest data. Extremely light bosons with a de Broglie wavelength of 1kpc have been suggested as dark matter candidates that may resolve some of the current small scale problems of the cold dark matter model. For the first time, we use hydrodynamical simulations to model the Lyman-α flux power spectrum in these models and compare it to the observed flux power spectrum from two different data sets: the XQ-100 and HIRES/MIKE quasar spectra samples. After marginalization over nuisance and physical parameters and with conservative assumptions for the thermal history of the intergalactic medium (IGM) that allow for jumps in the temperature of up to 5000 K, XQ-100 provides a lower limit of 7.1×1022eV, HIRES/MIKE returns a stronger limit of 14.3×1022eV, while the combination of both data sets results in a limit of 20×1022eV (2σ C.L.). The limits for the analysis of the combined data sets increases to 37.5×1022eV (2σ C.L.) when a smoother thermal history is assumed where the temperature of the IGM evolves as a power law in redshift. Light boson masses in the range 110×1022eV are ruled out at high significance by our analysis, casting strong doubts that FDM helps solve the “small scale crisis” of the cold dark matter models.

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  • Received 19 March 2017

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.119.031302

© 2017 American Physical Society

Physics Subject Headings (PhySH)

Gravitation, Cosmology & Astrophysics

Authors & Affiliations

Vid Iršič1,2,3,*, Matteo Viel4,5,6,†, Martin G. Haehnelt7, James S. Bolton8, and George D. Becker7,9

  • 1University of Washington, Department of Astronomy, 3910 15th Avenue Northeast, Seattle, Washington 98195-1580, USA
  • 2Institute for Advanced Study, 1 Einstein Drive, Princeton, New Jersey 08540, USA
  • 3The Abdus Salam International Centre for Theoretical Physics, Strada Costiera 11, I-34151 Trieste, Italy
  • 4SISSA—International School for Advanced Studies, Via Bonomea 265, 34136 Trieste, Italy
  • 5INAF—Osservatorio Astronomico di Trieste, Via G.B. Tiepolo 11, I-34143 Trieste, Italy
  • 6INFN—National Institute for Nuclear Physics, via Valerio 2, I-34127 Trieste, Italy
  • 7Institute of Astronomy and Kavli Institute of Cosmology, Madingley Road, Cambridge CB3 0HA, United Kingdom
  • 8School of Physics and Astronomy, University of Nottingham, University Park, Nottingham NG7 2RD, United Kingdom
  • 9Space Telescope Science Institute, 3700 San Martin Drive, Baltimore, Maryland 21218, USA

  • *irsic@uw.edu
  • viel@sissa.it

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Issue

Vol. 119, Iss. 3 — 21 July 2017

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