Stimulated capture of axion dark matter around primordial black holes

Nuno P. Branco; João G. Rosa

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arXiv · 2610.21951

Stimulated capture of axion dark matter around primordial black holes

Nuno P. Branco·João G. Rosa

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Abstract

We study the stimulated capture of axion and axion-like particles around primordial black holes, mediated by quartic self-interactions. We identify the parametric regions where Bose-enhanced growth overcomes cosmological dilution and derive analytic criteria for efficient formation and long-term survival of the hydrogenic ground-state cloud, confronting them with current bounds on axion-photon couplings. We discuss observational implications of these PBH+cloud systems, including resonant axion-to-photon conversion in neutron star magnetospheres and finite-size microlensing distortions. In the former case, the resonance condition selects a conversion shell outside the neutron star surface, and we show that the large axion occupation number of the cloud can compensate for the small conversion probability. The resulting transient line flux densities can exceed nominal VLA and ALMA sensitivities in regions where the Galactic encounter rate is observationally relevant. Independently, when the cloud size becomes comparable to or larger than the Einstein radius, finite-size effects can modify the standard point-lens microlensing light curve.

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Nuno P. Branco, João G. Rosa. 2026-10-15. Stimulated capture of axion dark matter around primordial black holes. https://arxiv.org/abs/2610.21951

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