Probing the sterile neutrino portal to Dark Matter with $\gamma$ rays

Abstract

Sterile neutrinos could provide a link between the Standard Model particles and a dark sector, besides generating active neutrino masses via the seesaw mechanism type I. We show that, if dark matter annihilation into sterile neutrinos determines its observed relic abundance, it is possible to explain the Galactic Center $\gamma$-ray excess reported by the Fermi-LAT Collaboration as due to an astrophysical component plus dark matter annihilations. We observe that sterile neutrino portal to dark matter provides an impressively good fit, with a p-value of 0.78 in the best fit point, to the Galactic Center $\gamma$-ray flux, for DM masses in the range (40-80) GeV and sterile neutrino masses 20 GeV $\lesssim M_N<M_{DM}$. Such values are compatible with the limits from Fermi-LAT observations of the dwarfs spheroidal galaxies in the Milky Way halo, which rule out dark matter masses below $\sim$ 50 GeV (90 GeV), for sterile neutrino masses $M_N\lesssim M_{DM}$ ($M_N\ll M_{DM}$). We also estimate the impact of AMS-02 anti-proton data on this scenario.

Comments: 16 pages + references, 7 figures. Discussion about AMS-02 antiproton constraints added. Published version