We report new constraints on the velocity-independent annihilation cross section $⟨\sigma v⟩$ of keV-scale dark matter particles based on 11 years of observations with the Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array (NuSTAR) x-ray observatory. Using the unfocused stray light mode of the instrument, which provides a wide field-of-view and a stable instrumental background, we perform a sensitive search for photon signatures from dark matter annihilation in the Galactic halo. We model the resulting diffuse x-ray spectrum over the 3–20 keV energy range and search for linelike spectral features that may arise from the annihilation of dark matter particles into photons. No statistically significant excess over the expected astrophysical background is found. We therefore place upper limits on $⟨\sigma v⟩$ as a function of dark matter mass, assuming a velocity-independent s-wave annihilation and several Galactic dark matter profiles. Across most of the explored mass range our results provide the strongest x-ray constraints to date, reaching the level of $⟨\sigma v⟩\lesssim {10}^{-33}-{10}^{-34}{\mathrm{cm}}^3{\mathrm{s}}^{-1}$, and they complement the most recent estimates obtained from observations of the ART-XC telescope of the Spektr-RG observatory.

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• Dark matter
• Particle dark matter
• X ray astronomy
• Galactic halos
• Milky Way
• Telescopes