High Energy Physics Seminar

The matter power spectrum is only weakly constrained on subgalactic scales, while physics beyond the Standard Model can leave unique imprints especially on sub-parsec scales. We propose measuring the arrival time difference of Fast Radio Bursts (FRBs) along two adjacent sightlines as a new probe to dark matter substructures on scales down to ~AU. We discuss two observational scenarios in which it may be possible to place interesting constraints on such models through monitoring repeating FRB sources: 1) By sending radio receivers to space to form a baseline of tens of AU or more and measuring the temporal variation of the arrival time difference between receivers. 2) By measuring the temporal variation of the arrival time difference between two lensed images of one strongly lensed repeater. In both scenarios, obtaining interesting constraints requires correlating the voltage time series to measure the radio-signal arrival time to sub-nanosecond precision. We find that two radio dishes separated by 20 AU may be sensitive to the enhancement of small-scale structures at 10^-8 Solar masses in the QCD axion dark matter scenario or from an early epoch of matter-domination with a reheating temperature up to 60 MeV.

The talk is in 469 Lauritsen.

Contact [email protected] for Zoom link.