On the Nature of the Dark Halo of Our Galaxy

Details On the Nature of the Dark Halo of Our Galaxy On the Nature of the Dark Halo of Our Galaxy

Feb 1992

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=1992a%26a...254...99d&link_type=abstract

Astronomy and Astrophysics, Vol.254, NO. FEB(I), P. 99, 1992

Astronomy and Astrophysics

Astrophysics

70

Dark Matter, Galaxy: Halo Of, Stars: Low Mass, Brown Dwarfs, Gravitational Lensing

Scientific paper

We investigate in detail the acceptable possibility that the dark constituents of galactic halos be brown dwarfs, compact hydrogenous objects of mass below the nuclear ignition threshold M ≃0.08 Msun. We demonstrate that these objects would have evaporated away in a galactic time scale if lighter than 10-7 Msun, and that their mass distribution, normalized to the dark halo mass density, could be a smooth continuation of the known initial mass function of ordinary stars. Massive compact objects in the halo of our galaxy can be detected via their gravitational "microlensing" effect on the image of stars in the Large Magellanic Cloud. Ongoing microlensing searches are sensitive to lensing masses in the range 10-7 < M/Msun < 10-1. This bracket cosily coincides with the allowed mass domain for brown dwarfs, heralding a decisive answer on these putative constituents of our galactic dark mass.

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