UC Irvine

Although many independent astrophysical and cosmological observations imply the existence

of a new dark matter particle, experimental searches have so far been unable to provide

any conclusive evidence of such a particle. The study of dark matter and its behavior

in astrophysical systems is a promising directions for current and future searches, as the

sheer scale of these systems allows physicists to probe regions of parameter space that are

unreachable in laboratory or collider experiments. This thesis will describe several ways in

which we may test dark matter models using astrophysical observations. Chapters 2, 3, and

4 will describe the use of gamma-ray and cosmic-ray data in testing and constraining WIMP

dark matter models. Chapter 5 will discuss dark hydrogen as a possible self-interacting dark

matter candidate, and provide testable predictions for future observations.