Using neutron stars to probe dark matter charged under a $L_\mu-L_\tau$ symmetry

Abstract

Kinetic heating of old cold neutron stars, via the scattering of dark matter with matter in the star, provides a promising way to probe the nature of dark matter interactions. We consider a dark matter candidate that is a Standard Model singlet Dirac fermion, charged under a $U(1)_{L_\mu-L_\tau}$ symmetry. Such dark matter interacts with quarks and electrons only via loop-induced couplings, and hence is weakly constrained by direct-detection experiments and cosmic-microwave background observations. However, tree-level interactions with muons enable the dark matter to interact efficiently with the relativistic muon component of a neutron star, heating the star substantially. Using a fully relativistic approach for dark matter capture in the star, we show that observations of old cold neutron stars can probe a substantial, yet unexplored, region of parameter space for dark matter masses in the range 100 MeV - 100 GeV.