J Schieck, G Angloher, A Bento, C Bucci, L Canonica, X Defay, A Erb, F v Feilitzsch, N Ferreiro Iachellini, P Gorla, A Guetlein, D Hauff, J Jochum, M Kiefer, H Kluck, H Kraus, J-C Lanfranchi, J Loebell, M Mancuso, A Muenster, C Pagliarone, F Petricca, W Potzel, F Pröbst, R Puig, F Reindl, K Schaeffner, S Schoenert, W Seidel, M Stahlberg, L Stodolsky, C Strandhagen, R Strauss, A Tanzke, H H Trinh Thi, C Turkoglu, M Uffinger, A Ulrich, I Usherov, S Wawoczny, M Willers, M Wueustrich, A Zoeller

The quest for the particle nature of dark matter is one of the big open questions of modern physics. A well motivated candidate for dark matter is the so-called WIMP - a weakly interacting massive particle. Recently several theoretically well-motivated models with dark matter candidates in a mass region below the WIMP mass-scale gained also a lot of interest, theoretically and experimentally. The CRESST II experiment located at the Gran Sasso laboratory in Italy is optimised for the detection of the elastic scattering of these low-mass dark matter particles with ordinary matter. We show the results obtained with an improved detector setup with increased radio purity and enhanced background rejection and the results obtained with a dedicated low-threshold analysis of a single conventional detector module. The limit achieved is the most stringent limit achieved for direct dark matter experiments in the mass region below 1.8 GeV/$c^{2}$. We will discuss the expected performance for new small CRESST-type detectors to be used during the next data taking phase. We conclude with an outlook of the future potential for direct dark matter detection using further improved CRESST CaWO$_{4}$ cryogenic detectors.

Thomas Lacroix, Mansour Karami, Avery E. Broderick, Joseph Silk, Celine Boehm

We demonstrate the unprecedented capabilities of the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) to image the innermost dark matter profile in the vicinity of the supermassive black hole at the center of the M87 radio galaxy. We present the first model of the synchrotron emission induced by dark matter annihilations from a spiky profile in the close vicinity of a supermassive black hole, accounting for strong gravitational lensing effects. Our results show that the EHT should readily resolve dark matter spikes if present. Moreover, the photon ring surrounding the silhouette of the black hole is clearly visible in the spike emission, which introduces observable small-scale structure into the signal. We find that the dark matter-induced emission provides an adequate fit to the existing EHT data, implying that in addition to the jet, a dark matter spike may account for a sizable portion of the millimeter emission from the innermost (sub-parsec) region of M87. Regardless, our results show that the EHT can probe very weakly annihilating dark matter. Current EHT observations already constrain very small cross-sections, typically down to a few 10^{-31} cm^3/s for a 10 GeV candidate, close to characteristic values for p-wave-suppressed annihilation. Future EHT observations will further improve constraints on the DM scenario.

Kenneth Patton, Jonathan Blazek, Klaus Honscheid, Eric Huff, Peter Melchior, Ashley J. Ross, Eric Suchyta

We examine the cosmological information available from the 1-point probability distribution (PDF) of the weak-lensing convergence field, utilizing fast L-PICOLA simulations and a Fisher analysis. We find competitive constraints in the $\Omega_m$-$\sigma_8$ plane from the convergence PDF with $188\ arcmin^2$ pixels compared to the cosmic shear power spectrum with an equivalent number of modes ($\ell < 886$). The convergence PDF also partially breaks the degeneracy cosmic shear exhibits in that parameter space. A joint analysis of the convergence PDF and shear 2-point function also reduces the impact of shape measurement systematics, to which the PDF is less susceptible, and improves the total figure of merit by a factor of $2-3$, depending on the level of systematics. Finally, we present a correction factor necessary for calculating the unbiased Fisher information from finite differences using a limited number of cosmological simulations.

Jeremy Sakstein, Michael Kenna-Allison, Kazuya Koyama

Theories of gravity in the beyond Horndeski class recover the predictions of general relativity in the solar system whilst admitting novel cosmologies, including late-time de Sitter solutions in the absence of a cosmological constant. Deviations from Newton's law are predicted inside astrophysical bodies, which allow for falsifiable, smoking-gun tests of the theory. In this work we study the pulsations of stars by deriving and solving the wave equation governing linear adiabatic oscillations to find the modified period of pulsation. Using both semi-analytic and numerical models, we perform a preliminary survey of the stellar zoo in an attempt to identify the best candidate objects for testing the theory. Brown dwarfs and Cepheid stars are found to be particularly sensitive objects and we discuss the possibility of using both to test the theory.

Chan-Gyung Park, Hwasu Hyun, Hyerim Noh, Jai-chan Hwang

The homogeneity of matter distribution at large scales is a central assumption in the standard cosmological model. The case is testable though, thus no longer needs to be a principle, and indeed there have been claims that the distribution of galaxies is homogeneous at radius scales larger than 70 Mpc/h. Here we perform a test for homogeneity using the Sloan Digital Sky Survey Luminous Red Galaxies (LRG) sample by counting galaxies within a specified volume with the radius scale varying up to 300 Mpc/h. Our analysis differs from the previous ones in that we directly confront the large-scale structure data with the definition of spatial homogeneity by comparing the fluctuations of individual number counts with allowed ranges of the random distribution with homogeneity. The LRG sample shows much larger fluctuations of number counts than the random catalogs up to 300 Mpc/h scale, and even the average is located far outside the range allowed in the random distribution, which implies that the cosmological principle does not hold even at such large scales. The same analysis of mock galaxies derived from the N-body simulation, however, suggests that the LRG sample is consistent with the current paradigm of cosmology. Thus, we conclude that the cosmological principle is not in the observed sky and nor is demanded to be there by the standard cosmological world model. This reveals the nature of the cosmological principle adopted in the modern cosmology paradigm, and opens new field of research in theoretical cosmology.

Ivan Esteban, M. C. Gonzalez-Garcia, Michele Maltoni, Ivan Martinez-Soler, Thomas Schwetz

We perform a combined fit to global neutrino oscillation data available as of fall 2016 in the scenario of three-neutrino oscillations and present updated allowed ranges of the six oscillation parameters. We discuss the differences arising between the consistent combination of the data samples from accelerator and reactor experiments compared to partial combinations. We quantify the confidence in the determination of the less precisely known parameters $\theta_{23}$, $\delta_\text{CP}$, and the neutrino mass ordering by performing a Monte Carlo study of the long baseline accelerator and reactor data. We find that the sensitivity to the mass ordering and the $\theta_{23}$ octant is below $1\sigma$. Maximal $\theta_{23}$ mixing is allowed at slightly more than 90% CL. The best fit for the CP violating phase is around $270^\circ$, CP conservation is allowed at slightly above $1\sigma$, and values of $\delta_\text{CP} \simeq 90^\circ$ are disfavored at around 99% CL for normal ordering and higher CL for inverted ordering.

Erik P. Verlinde

Recent theoretical progress indicates that spacetime and gravity emerge \break together from the entanglement structure of an underlying microscopic theory. These~ideas are best understood in Anti-de Sitter space, where they rely~on~the area law for entanglement entropy. The extension to de Sitter space requires taking into account the entropy and temperature associated with the cosmological horizon. Using insights from string theory, black hole physics and quantum information theory we argue that the positive dark energy leads to a thermal volume law contribution to the entropy that overtakes the area law precisely at the cosmological horizon. Due to the competition between area and volume law entanglement the microscopic de Sitter states do not thermalise at sub-Hubble scales: they exhibit memory effects in the form of an entropy displacement caused by matter. The emergent laws of gravity contain an additional `dark' gravitational force describing the `elastic' response due to the entropy displacement. We derive an estimate of the strength of this extra force in terms of the baryonic mass, Newton's constant and the Hubble acceleration scale $a_0 =cH_0$, and provide evidence for the fact that this additional `dark gravity~force' explains the observed phenomena in galaxies and clusters currently attributed to dark~matter.

Nassim Bozorgnia, Graciela B. Gelmini, Paolo Gondolo

Directional dark matter detection attempts to measure the direction of motion of nuclei recoiling after having interacted with dark matter particles in the halo of our Galaxy. Due to Earth's motion with respect to the Galaxy, the dark matter flux is concentrated around a preferential direction. An anisotropy in the recoil direction rate is expected as an unmistakable signature of dark matter. The average nuclear recoil direction is expected to coincide with the average direction of dark matter particles arriving to Earth. Here we point out that for a particular type of dark matter, inelastic exothermic dark matter, the mean recoil direction as well as a secondary feature, a ring of maximum recoil rate around the mean recoil direction, could instead be opposite to the average dark matter arrival direction. Thus, the detection of an average nuclear recoil direction opposite to the usually expected direction would constitute a spectacular experimental confirmation of this type of dark matter.

Alessandro De Angelis, Vincent Tatischeff, Marco Tavani, Uwe Oberlack, Isabelle Grenier, Lorraine Hanlon, Roland Walter, Andrea Argan, Peter von Ballmoos, Andrea Bulgarelli, Immacolata Donnarumma, Margarita Hernanz, Irfan Kuvvetli, Mark Pierce, Alessio Aboudan, Marco Ajello, Giovanni Ambrosi, Denis Bernard, Elisa Bernardini, Andrea Borgna, Marica Branchesi, Andrei Bykov, Riccardo Campana, Martina Cardillo, Paolo Coppi, Domitilla De Martino, Roland Diehl, Michele Doro, Valentina Fioretti, Stefan Funk, Gabriele Ghisellini, Eric Grove, Clarisse Hamadache, Dieter H. Hartmann, Masaaki Hayashida, Gottfried Kanbach, Jurgen Kiener, Jurgen Knodlseder, Claudio Labanti, Philippe Laurent, Olivier Limousin, Karl Mannheim, Martino Marisaldi, Manel Martinez, Mario N. Mazziotta, Julie McEnery, Sandro Mereghetti, et al. (22 additional authors not shown)

e-ASTROGAM (`enhanced ASTROGAM') is a breakthrough Observatory mission dedicated to the study of the non-thermal Universe in the photon energy range from 0.3 MeV to 3 GeV. The mission is based on an advanced space-proven detector technology, with unprecedented sensitivity, angular and energy resolution, combined with polarimetric capability. In the largely unexplored MeV-GeV domain, e-ASTROGAM will open a new window on the non-thermal Universe, making pioneering observations of the most powerful Galactic and extragalactic sources, elucidating the nature of their relativistic outflows and their effects on Galactic ecosystems. With a line sensitivity in the MeV energy range one to two orders of magnitude better than previous generation instruments, will determine the origin of key isotopes fundamental for the understanding of supernova explosion and the chemical evolution of our Galaxy. The mission will provide unique data of significant interest to a broad astronomical community, complementary to powerful observatories such as LIGO-Virgo-GEO600-KAGRA, SKA, ALMA, E-ELT, TMT, LSST, JWST, Athena, CTA, IceCube, KM3NeT, and the promise of eLISA. Keywords: High-energy gamma-ray astronomy, High-energy astrophysics, Nuclear Astrophysics, Compton and Pair creation telescope, Gamma-ray bursts, Active Galactic Nuclei, Jets, Outflows, Multiwavelength observations of the Universe, Counterparts of gravitational waves, Fermi, Dark Matter, Nucleosynthesis, Early Universe, Supernovae, Cosmic Rays, Cosmic antimatter.