An Interpretation of Flat Density Cores of Clusters of Galaxies by Degeneracy Pressure of Fermionic Dark Matter: A Case Study of Abell 1689

Abstract

Flat density cores have been obtained for a limited number of clusters of galaxies by strong gravitational lensing. This paper explores the possibility that the degeneracy pressure of fermionic dark matter accounts for the flat top density profiles. This is a case study of A1689 for which the density profile has been obtained from the inner region out to 1Mpc by the combination of strong and weak lensing. In the case that the dark matter consists of the mixture of degenerate relic neutrinos and collisionless cold dark matter particles, the acceptable mass range for relic neutrinos is between 1 and 2 eV, if the ratio of the two kinds of dark matter particles is fixed to its cosmic value.