Core-collapse universality for inelastic self-interacting dark matter halos
Abstract
We study the gravothermal collapse of inelastic dark matter halos with velocity-dependent elastic and dissipative self-interactions. Within the gravothermal fluid framework, we derive the effective cooling rate for dark matter upscattering to an excited state followed by decay back to the ground state, with emitted states carrying off energy from the halo. We solve the gravothermal fluid equations numerically to simulate spherically symmetric halos over the core-growing and collapse phases of their evolution. While halos with purely elastic self-interactions have universal evolution trajectories, inelastic dark matter halos exhibit much more diversity in their evolution. Nevertheless, inelastic halo dynamics contain a hidden parametric universality from which we derive a semi-analytic formula for calculating the halo collapse time for arbitrary velocity-dependent elastic and inelastic cross sections without the need for simulations.
Related
- Testing the Isothermal Jeans Model for Self-interacting Dark Matter Halos in the Collapse Phase
- High-redshift supermassive black hole population from core-collapse in self-interacting dark matter halos
- Gravothermal Evolution of Self-Interacting Dark Matter Halos across Knudsen Numbers
- Searching for signatures of self-interacting dark matter in halos from full physics simulations: From 3D structure to projected observables
- Inelastic Self-interacting Dark Matter and LUX-ZEPLIN 248 keV Event in a Dirac Modular Inverse Seesaw
BibTeX
@misc{batteas2026corecollapse,
title = {{Core-collapse universality for inelastic self-interacting dark matter halos}},
author = {Evan Batteas and Alexander Brisebois and Maheen Hemani and Maximilian Heyne and J. Leo Kim and Lukas Lehmann and Laura Sagunski and Aster Schnell and Sean Tulin},
howpublished = {arXiv},
year = {2026},
month = oct,
doi = {10.48550/arxiv.2610.37852},
eprint = {2610.37852},
archivePrefix = {arXiv},
url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2610.37852},
}
RIS
TY - UNPB
TI - Core-collapse universality for inelastic self-interacting dark matter halos
AU - Evan Batteas
AU - Alexander Brisebois
AU - Maheen Hemani
AU - Maximilian Heyne
AU - J. Leo Kim
AU - Lukas Lehmann
AU - Laura Sagunski
AU - Aster Schnell
AU - Sean Tulin
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/10/27
PB - arXiv
DO - 10.48550/arxiv.2610.37852
UR - https://arxiv.org/abs/2610.37852
AB - We study the gravothermal collapse of inelastic dark matter halos with velocity-dependent elastic and dissipative self-interactions. Within the gravothermal fluid framework, we derive the effective cooling rate for dark matter upscattering to an excited state followed by decay back to the ground state, with emitted states carrying off energy from the halo. We solve the gravothermal fluid equations numerically to simulate spherically symmetric halos over the core-growing and collapse phases of their evolution. While halos with purely elastic self-interactions have universal evolution trajectories, inelastic dark matter halos exhibit much more diversity in their evolution. Nevertheless, inelastic halo dynamics contain a hidden parametric universality from which we derive a semi-analytic formula for calculating the halo collapse time for arbitrary velocity-dependent elastic and inelastic cross sections without the need for simulations.
ER -