Indirect Evidence for Dark Matter Density Spikes around Stellar-mass Black Holes

Abstract

Abstract It has been suggested for a long time that dark matter would form a density spike around a black hole. However, no promising evidence has been observed so far to verify this theoretical suggestion. Here, we report the existence of a dark matter density spike around each of the two nearby stellar-mass black holes (A0620-00 and XTE J1118+480). The dynamical friction between dark matter and the companion stars can satisfactorily explain the abnormally fast orbital decays in the two binaries. The calculated spike index for A0620-00 and XTE J1118+480 is <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" overflow="scroll"> <mml:mi>γ</mml:mi> <mml:mo>=</mml:mo> <mml:msubsup> <mml:mrow> <mml:mn>1.71</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>−</mml:mo> <mml:mn>0.02</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>+</mml:mo> <mml:mn>0.01</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> </mml:msubsup> </mml:math> and <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" overflow="scroll"> <mml:mi>γ</mml:mi> <mml:mo>=</mml:mo> <mml:msubsup> <mml:mrow> <mml:mn>1.85</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>−</mml:mo> <mml:mn>0.04</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>+</mml:mo> <mml:mn>0.04</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> </mml:msubsup> </mml:math> , respectively, which are close to the lower regime predicted by the stellar heating model. It may provide possible indirect evidence for the existence of dark matter density spikes around stellar-mass black holes. We anticipate that analyzing observational data of nearby black hole X-ray binaries would be a new way to reveal the nature of dark matter.