{"paper":{"title":"WIMP Meets ALP: Coherent Freeze-Out of Dark Matter","license":"http://arxiv.org/licenses/nonexclusive-distrib/1.0/","headline":"A quadratic coupling between WIMPs and a light ALP induces temperature-dependent mass shifts that delay freeze-out and produce an ALP relic largely independent of initial conditions.","cross_cats":["astro-ph.CO"],"primary_cat":"hep-ph","authors_text":"Bingrong Yu, Maxim Perelstein, Steven Ferrante","submitted_at":"2025-11-20T19:00:01Z","abstract_excerpt":"We consider the cosmological history of a weakly interacting massive particle (WIMP) coupled to a light axion-like particle (ALP) via a quadratic coupling. Although the coupling is too feeble to thermalize the ALP, coherent forward scattering between the two sectors induces temperature-dependent mass shifts that substantially modify both WIMP freeze-out and ALP misalignment dynamics, giving rise to a novel coherent freeze-out mechanism. At high temperatures, the WIMP thermal bath spontaneously breaks the symmetry of the ALP potential, displacing the field to a new vacuum. The resulting back-re"},"claims":{"count":4,"items":[{"kind":"strongest_claim","text":"In the FOPT regime, dark matter consists solely of WIMPs, whose delayed freeze-out permits annihilation cross sections up to three orders of magnitude above the standard value, while still yielding the correct relic density. In the crossover regime, both WIMP and ALP can contribute to dark matter. Remarkably, we find an 'ALP miracle': a Planck-suppressed quadratic coupling yields an ALP abundance comparable to the observed dark matter density, largely independent of its initial displacement and mass.","source":"verdict.strongest_claim","status":"machine_extracted","claim_id":"C1","attestation":"unclaimed"},{"kind":"weakest_assumption","text":"The quadratic coupling is too feeble to thermalize the ALP yet strong enough for coherent forward scattering to produce substantial temperature-dependent mass shifts that alter both WIMP freeze-out timing and ALP vacuum displacement.","source":"verdict.weakest_assumption","status":"machine_extracted","claim_id":"C2","attestation":"unclaimed"},{"kind":"one_line_summary","text":"Quadratic WIMP-ALP coupling induces coherent freeze-out that allows WIMP annihilation cross sections up to 1000 times larger than standard while matching relic density, plus an ALP miracle where Planck-suppressed couplings naturally yield correct ALP dark matter abundance independent of initial mass","source":"verdict.one_line_summary","status":"machine_extracted","claim_id":"C3","attestation":"unclaimed"},{"kind":"headline","text":"A quadratic coupling between WIMPs and a light ALP induces temperature-dependent mass shifts that delay freeze-out and produce an ALP relic largely independent of initial conditions.","source":"verdict.pith_extraction.headline","status":"machine_extracted","claim_id":"C4","attestation":"unclaimed"}],"snapshot_sha256":"f59c37d8b35575a212693e2251de8fccfb8ad1aa775162698bdfd1eb89327cf2"},"source":{"id":"2511.16731","kind":"arxiv","version":2},"verdict":{"id":"86053db6-d7d2-40f6-85ac-e732794119a4","model_set":{"reader":"grok-4.3"},"created_at":"2026-05-17T20:18:45.204974Z","strongest_claim":"In the FOPT regime, dark matter consists solely of WIMPs, whose delayed freeze-out permits annihilation cross sections up to three orders of magnitude above the standard value, while still yielding the correct relic density. In the crossover regime, both WIMP and ALP can contribute to dark matter. Remarkably, we find an 'ALP miracle': a Planck-suppressed quadratic coupling yields an ALP abundance comparable to the observed dark matter density, largely independent of its initial displacement and mass.","one_line_summary":"Quadratic WIMP-ALP coupling induces coherent freeze-out that allows WIMP annihilation cross sections up to 1000 times larger than standard while matching relic density, plus an ALP miracle where Planck-suppressed couplings naturally yield correct ALP dark matter abundance independent of initial mass","pipeline_version":"pith-pipeline@v0.9.0","weakest_assumption":"The quadratic coupling is too feeble to thermalize the ALP yet strong enough for coherent forward scattering to produce substantial temperature-dependent mass shifts that alter both WIMP freeze-out timing and ALP vacuum displacement.","pith_extraction_headline":"A quadratic coupling between WIMPs and a light ALP induces temperature-dependent mass shifts that delay freeze-out and produce an ALP relic largely independent of initial conditions."},"integrity":{"clean":true,"summary":{"advisory":0,"critical":0,"by_detector":{},"informational":0},"endpoint":"/pith/2511.16731/integrity.json","findings":[],"available":true,"detectors_run":[],"snapshot_sha256":"c28c3603d3b5d939e8dc4c7e95fa8dfce3d595e45f758748cecf8e644a296938"},"references":{"count":25,"sample":[{"doi":"","year":null,"title":"This equation can be solved numerically for any fixedκ, as shown in Fig","work_id":"8f7b1f1a-0978-45bb-9288-2398869434ad","ref_index":1,"cited_arxiv_id":"","is_internal_anchor":false},{"doi":"","year":null,"title":"In the medium of the ALP background, the effective mass of the WIMP is shifted frommχ tom χ,eff = γ(φ)m χ, whereγ(φ) =|1−φ 2/2|is the field-dependent boost factor","work_id":"6d6ac385-1e8b-4a0f-827b-c123651b6d8e","ref_index":2,"cited_arxiv_id":"","is_internal_anchor":false},{"doi":"","year":2024,"title":"M. Cirelli, A. Strumia, and J. Zupan, (2024), arXiv:2406.01705 [hep-ph]","work_id":"37c4bfed-9b75-43f4-96fe-1b75751acf8f","ref_index":3,"cited_arxiv_id":"2406.01705","is_internal_anchor":true},{"doi":"","year":2016,"title":"Axion Cosmology","work_id":"ef5771a4-50af-4604-8044-820052508515","ref_index":4,"cited_arxiv_id":"1510.07633","is_internal_anchor":true},{"doi":"","year":2010,"title":"Sub-eV scalar dark matter through the super-renormalizable Higgs portal","work_id":"29cd0df0-8b2f-4dd9-bf80-243820cc7b96","ref_index":5,"cited_arxiv_id":"1003.2313","is_internal_anchor":true}],"resolved_work":25,"snapshot_sha256":"811a636cd8703cd2bb51939801612678e5857c456647a07ccc87da1261c625c7","internal_anchors":12},"formal_canon":{"evidence_count":2,"snapshot_sha256":"26ec4badd03962dcc87987836875739de73ff13d72f3c7bf4fa0257cce42a1ae"},"author_claims":{"count":0,"strong_count":0,"snapshot_sha256":"258153158e38e3291e3d48162225fcdb2d5a3ed65a07baac614ab91432fd4f57"},"builder_version":"pith-number-builder-2026-05-17-v1"}