Structure and Local Properties of Dark Matter Halos

The structure and local properties of dark matter (DM) are important input variables for both direct and indirect detection experiments. Common assumptions about DM, such as, its particle nature being cold and collisionless–CDM–and its distribution in halos being isothermal and spherical, and well-modeled by an isotopic Maxwell-Boltzmann velocity distribution–the Standard Halo Model (SHM)–prove to be at odds with astrophysical observations. In this thesis I present work towards elucidating two areas of refinement to the above-mentioned assumptions regarding DM: 1) allowing moderate self-interactions between DM particles (SIDM), extending the semi-analytic Jeans modeling technique for SIDM halos to multiple dimensions and including baryons and nonspherical effects to study the resulting change in the DM halo structure; 2) quantifying the departure from the SHM by analyzing hydrodynamical simulations of Milky Way (MW) like halos to characterize the impact on local properties of DM induced by satellite galaxies like the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) and their implications for direct detection experiments.