An Etymological Dictionary of Astronomy and Astrophysics

A hypothetical stellar object whose structure or evolution has been affected by → dark matter. Dark matter models predict that in the → early Universe dark matter (in the form of → WIMPs) should congregate and annihilate in the cores of → Population III stars. The result would be dark stars with properties very different from ordinary stars. The reason is that the presence of large amounts of dark matter during the formation of a star inhibits the collapse and can partially prevent further cooling of the gas beyond a certain critical point, well before a → main sequence object has formed. As a consequence, dark matter stars should be more massive, more luminous, and live longer than Pop. III stars, but would be cooler. The formation of dark stars could have had an
impact on the → reionization history of the Universe (see, e.g., P. Scott, 2011, astro-ph/1101.1029, and references therein).

See also: → dark; → star.