Free-free background radiation from accreting primordial black holes (2108.01916v2)

Abstract: Baryonic gas falling onto a primordial black hole (PBH) emits photons via the free-free process. These photons can contribute the diffuse free-free background radiation in the frequency range of the cosmic microwave background radiation (CMB). We show that the intensity of the free-free background radiation from PBHs depends on the mass and abundance of PBHs. In particular, considering the growth of a dark matter (DM) halo around a PBH by non-PBH DM particles strongly enhances the free-free background radiation. Large PBH fraction increase the signal of the free-free emission. However, large PBH fraction also can heat the IGM gas and, accordingly, suppresses the accretion rate. As a result, the free-free emission decreases when the PBH fraction is larger than 0.1. We find that the free-free emission from PBHs in the CMB and radio frequency is much lower than the CMB blackbody spectrum and the observed free-free emission component in the background radiation. Therefore, it is difficult to obtain the constraint from the free-free emission observation. However further theoretical understanding and observation on the free-free emission from cosmological origin is helpful to study the PBH abundance with the stellar mass.