Dark antiatoms can explain DAMA

Abstract

We show that the existence of a sub-dominant form of dark matter, made of dark "antiatoms" of mass m∼ 1 TeV and size 0∼ 3 fm, can explain the results of direct detection experiments, with a positive signal in DAMA/NaI and DAMA/LIBRA and no signal in other experiments. The signal comes from the binding of the dark antiatoms to thallium, a dopant in DAMA, and is not present for the constituent atoms of other experiments. The dark antiatoms are made of two particles oppositely charged under a dark U(1) symmetry and can bind to terrestrial atoms because of a kinetic mixing between the photon and the massless dark photon, such that the dark particles acquire an electric millicharge ∼ ± 5.10-4e. This millicharge enables them to bind to high-Z atoms via radiative capture, after they thermalize in terrestrial matter through elastic collisions.