How Dark is 'Dark'? Electromagnetic Interactions in the Dark Sector

Abstract

We review the physical and cosmological consequences of two possible electromagnetic couplings to the dark sector: (i) a neutral lightest dark-matter particle (LDP) with nonzero electric and/or magnetic dipole moments and (ii) a charged next-to-lightest dark-matter particle (NLDP) which decays to a neutral LDP. For scenario (i) we find that a relatively light particle with mass between a few MeV and a few GeV and an electric or magnetic dipole as large as $\sim 3\times 10^{-16}e$ cm (roughly $1.6\times10^{-5} μ_B$) satisfies experimental and observational bounds. In scenario (ii), we show that charged-particles decaying in the early Universe result in a suppression of the small-scale matter power spectrum on scales that enter the horizon prior to decay. This leads to either a cutoff in the matter power spectrum, or if the charged fraction is less than unity, an effect in the power spectrum that might resemble a running (scale-dependent) spectral index in small-scale data.