Dissipative dark cosmology: From early matter dominance to delayed compact objects

Abstract

We demonstrate a novel mechanism for producing dark compact objects and black holes through a dark sector, where all the dark matter can be dissipative. Heavy dark sector particles with masses above 104 GeV can come to dominate the Universe and yield an early matter-dominated era before big bang nucleosynthesis (BBN). Density perturbations in this epoch can grow and collapse into tiny dark matter halos, which cool via self-interactions. The typical halo size is set by the Hubble length once perturbations begin growing, offering a straightforward prediction of the halo size and evolution depending on one’s choice of dark matter model. Once these primordial halos have formed, a thermal phase transition can then shift the Universe back into radiation domination and standard cosmology. These halos can continue to collapse after BBN, resulting in the late-time formation of fragmented dark compact objects and sub-solar-mass primordial black holes. We find that these compact objects can constitute a sizable fraction of all of dark matter. The resulting fragments can have masses between 1020 and 1032 g, with radii ranging from 10−2 to 105 m, while the black holes can have masses between 108 and 1034 g. Furthermore, a unique feature of this model is the late-time formation of black holes which can evaporate today. We compare where these objects lie with respect to current primordial black hole and massive (astrophysical) compact halo object constraints. Published by the American Physical Society 2024