Massive particle decay and cold dark matter abundance

The decoupling of a cold relic during a decaying-particle-dominated cosmological evolution is analyzed, the relic density is calculated both numerically and semi-analytically and the results are compared with each other. Using plausible values (from the point of view of supersymmetric models) for the mass and the thermal-averaged cross-section times the velocity of the cold relic, we investigate scenaria of equilibrium or non-equilibrium production. In both cases, acceptable results for the dark matter abundance can be obtained, by constraining the reheat temperature of the decaying particle, its mass and the averaged number of the produced cold relic. The required reheat temperature is in any case lower than about 20 GeV. (C) 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.