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1. Dark Population Transfer Mechanism for Sterile Neutrino Dark Matter

   https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.133.181002  

   Fuller, George M; Gráf, Lukáš; Patwardhan, Amol V; Spisak, Jacob (October 2024, Physical Review Letters)

   We present a mechanism for producing a cosmologically significant relic density of one or more sterile neutrinos. This scheme invokes two steps: First, a population of “heavy” sterile neutrinos is created by scattering-induced decoherence of active neutrinos. Second, this population is transferred, via sterile neutrino self-interaction-mediated scatterings and decays, to one or more lighter mass ( $\sim 10\mathrm{keV}$to $\sim 1\mathrm{GeV}$) sterile neutrinos that are far more weakly (or not at all) mixed with active species and could constitute dark matter. Dark matter produced this way can evade current electromagnetic and structure-based bounds, but may nevertheless be probed by future observations. Published by the American Physical Society2024 

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2. Beyond Hawking evaporation of black holes formed by dark matter in compact stars

   https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevD.111.L041306  

   Basumatary, Ujjwal; Raj, Nirmal; Ray, Anupam (February 2025, Physical Review D)

   The memory burden effect is an explicit resolution to the information paradox by which an evaporating black hole acquires quantum hair, which then suppresses its rate of mass loss with respect to the semiclassical Hawking rate. We show that this has significant implications for particle dark matter that captures in neutron stars and forms black holes that go on to consume the host star. In particular, we show that constraints on the nucleon scattering cross section and mass of spin-0 and spin- $1/2$dark matter would be extended by several orders of magnitude. Published by the American Physical Society2025 

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3. Search for Light Dark Matter in Low-Energy Ionization Signals from XENONnT

   https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.134.161004  

   Aprile, E; Aalbers, J; Abe, K; Ahmed_Maouloud, S; Althueser, L; Andrieu, B; Angelino, E; Antón_Martin, D; Arneodo, F; Baudis, L; et al (April 2025, Physical Review Letters)

   We report on a blinded search for dark matter with single- and few-electron signals in the first science run of XENONnT relying on a novel detector response framework that is physics model dependent. We derive 90% confidence upper limits for dark matter-electron interactions. Heavy and light mediator cases are considered for the standard halo model and dark matter up-scattered in the Sun. We set stringent new limits on dark matter-electron scattering via a heavy mediator with a mass within $10–20\mathrm{MeV}/c^2$and electron absorption of axionlike particles and dark photons for $m_{\chi }$below $0.03\mathrm{keV}/c^2$. Published by the American Physical Society2025 

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4. More on black holes perceiving the dark dimension

   https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevD.110.015004  

   Anchordoqui, Luis A; Antoniadis, Ignatios; Lüst, Dieter (July 2024, Physical Review D)

   In the last two years, the dark dimension scenario has emerged as focal point of many research interests. In particular, it functions as a stepping stone to address the cosmological hierarchy problem and provides a colosseum for dark matter contenders. We reexamine the possibility that primordial black holes (PBHs) perceiving the dark dimension could constitute all of the dark matter in the Universe. We reassess limits on the abundance of PBHs as dark matter candidates from $\gamma$-ray emission resulting from Hawking evaporation. We reevaluate constraints from the diffuse $\gamma$-ray emission in the direction of the Galactic Center that offer the best and most solid upper limits on the dark matter fraction composed of PBHs. The revised mass range that allows PBHs to assemble all cosmological dark matter is estimated to be ${10}^{15}\lesssim M_{\mathrm{BH}}/\mathrm{g}\lesssim {10}^{21}$. We demonstrate that, due to the constraints from $\gamma$-ray emission, quantum corrections due to the speculative memory burden effect do not modify this mass range. We also investigate the main characteristics of PBHs that are localized in the bulk. We show that PBHs localized in the bulk can make all cosmological dark matter if ${10}^{11}\lesssim M_{\mathrm{BH}}/\mathrm{g}\lesssim {10}^{21}$. Finally, we comment on the black holes that could be produced if one advocates a space with two boundaries for the dark dimension. Published by the American Physical Society2024 

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5. Fully ab-initio all-electron calculation of dark matter-electron scattering in crystals with evaluation of systematic uncertainties

   https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevD.109.115008  

   Dreyer, Cyrus E; Essig, Rouven; Fernandez-Serra, Marivi; Singal, Aman; Zhen, Cheng (June 2024, Physical Review D)

   We calculate target-material responses for dark matter–electron scattering at the all-electron level using atom-centered Gaussian basis sets. The all-electron effects enhance the material response at high momentum transfers from dark matter to electrons, $q\gtrsim \mathcal{O}\left(10\alpha m_e\right)$, compared to calculations using conventional plane wave methods, including those used in ; this enhances the expected event rates at energy transfers $E\gtrsim 10\mathrm{eV}$, especially when scattering through heavy mediators. We carefully test a range of systematic uncertainties in the theory calculation, including those arising from the choice of basis set, exchange-correlation functional, number of unit cells in the Bloch sum, $\mathbf{k}$-mesh, and neglect of scatters with very high momentum transfers. We provide state-of-the-art crystal form factors, focusing on silicon and germanium. Our code and results are made publicly available as a new tool, called (“”). Published by the American Physical Society2024 

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