Attention:The NSF Public Access Repository (PAR) system and access will be unavailable from 11:00 PM ET on Thursday, October 15th until 12:00 AM ET on Friday, October 16th due to maintenance. We apologize for the inconvenience.


Title: Search for Light Dark Matter in Low-Energy Ionization Signals from XENONnT
We report on a blinded search for dark matter with single- and few-electron signals in the first science run of XENONnT relying on a novel detector response framework that is physics model dependent. We derive 90% confidence upper limits for dark matter-electron interactions. Heavy and light mediator cases are considered for the standard halo model and dark matter up-scattered in the Sun. We set stringent new limits on dark matter-electron scattering via a heavy mediator with a mass within 10–20  MeV/c2 and electron absorption of axionlike particles and dark photons for mχ below 0.03  keV/c2 . Published by the American Physical Society2025  more » « less
Award ID(s):
2112801 2112802 2112851 2112796
PAR ID:
10615400
Author(s) / Creator(s):
; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; more » ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; « less
Corporate Creator(s):
Publisher / Repository:
APS
Date Published:
Journal Name:
Physical Review Letters
Volume:
134
Issue:
16
ISSN:
0031-9007
Format(s):
Medium: X
Sponsoring Org:
National Science Foundation
More Like this
  1. This article presents constraints on dark-matter-electron interactions obtained from the first underground data-taking campaign with multiple SuperCDMS HVeV detectors operated in the same housing. An exposure of 7.63  g−days is used to set upper limits on the dark-matter-electron scattering cross section for dark matter masses between 0.5 and 1000  MeV/c2 , as well as upper limits on dark photon kinetic mixing and axionlike particle axioelectric coupling for masses between 1.2 and 23.3  eV/c2 . Compared to an earlier HVeV search, sensitivity was improved as a result of an increased overburden of 225 meters of water equivalent, an anticoincidence event selection, and better pile-up rejection. In the case of dark-matter-electron scattering via a heavy mediator, an improvement by up to a factor of 25 in cross section sensitivity was achieved. Published by the American Physical Society2025 
    more » « less
  2. We perform the first search for ultralight dark matter using a magnetically levitated particle. A submillimeter permanent magnet is levitated in a superconducting trap with a measured force sensitivity of 0.2  fN/ Hz . We find no evidence of a signal and derive limits on dark matter coupled to the difference between baryon and lepton number, B−L , in the mass range (1.10360−1.10485)×10−13  eV/c2 . Our most stringent limit on the coupling strength is gB−L ≲2.98×10−21 . We propose the POLONAISE (Probing Oscillations using Levitated Objects for Novel Accelerometry In Searches of Exotic physics) experiment, which features short-, medium-, and long-term upgrades that will give us leading sensitivity in a wide mass range, demonstrating the promise of this novel quantum sensing technology in the hunt for dark matter. Published by the American Physical Society2025 
    more » « less
  3. Dark matter particles could be superheavy, provided their lifetime is much longer than the age of the Universe. Using the sensitivity of the Pierre Auger Observatory to ultrahigh energy neutrinos and photons, we constrain a specific extension of the Standard Model of particle physics that meets the lifetime requirement for a superheavy particle by coupling it to a sector of ultralight sterile neutrinos. Our results show that, for a typical dark coupling constant of 0.1, the mixing angle θm between active and sterile neutrinos must satisfy, roughly, θm≲1.5×10−6(MX/109  GeV)−2 for a mass MX of the dark-matter particle between 108  GeV and 1011  GeV . Published by the American Physical Society2024 
    more » « less
  4. We search for dark matter (DM) with a mass [3,12]  GeV/c2 using an exposure of 3.51  tonne year with the XENONnT experiment. We consider spin-independent DM-nucleon interactions mediated by a heavy or light mediator, spin-dependent DM-neutron interactions, momentum-dependent DM scattering, and mirror DM. Using a lowered energy threshold compared to the previous weakly interacting massive particle search, a blind analysis of [0.5, 5.0] keV nuclear recoil events reveals no significant signal excess over the background. XENONnT excludes spin-independent DM-nucleon cross sections >2.5×10−45  cm2 at 90% confidence level for 6  GeV/c2 DM. In the considered mass range, the DM sensitivity approaches the “neutrino fog,” the limitation where neutrinos produce a signal that is indistinguishable from that of light DM-xenon nucleus scattering. Published by the American Physical Society2025 
    more » « less
  5. In this work, we expand on the XENON1T nuclear recoil searches to study the individual signals of dark matter interactions from operators up to dimension eight in a chiral effective field theory (ChEFT) and a model of inelastic dark matter (iDM). We analyze data from two science runs of the XENON1T detector totaling 1  t×yr exposure. For these analyses, we extended the region of interest from [4.9,40.9]   keVNR to [4.9,54.4]   keVNR to enhance our sensitivity for signals that peak at nonzero energies. We show that the data are consistent with the background-only hypothesis, with a small background overfluctuation observed peaking between 20 and 50   keVNR , resulting in a maximum local discovery significance of 1.7σ for the Vector⊗ Vectorstrange ChEFT channel for a dark matter particle of 70  GeV/c2 and 1.8σ for an iDM particle of 50  GeV/c2 with a mass splitting of 100  keV/c2 . For each model, we report 90% confidence level upper limits. We also report upper limits on three benchmark models of dark matter interaction using ChEFT where we investigate the effect of isospin-breaking interactions. We observe rate-driven cancellations in regions of the isospin-breaking couplings, leading to up to 6 orders of magnitude weaker upper limits with respect to the isospin-conserving case. Published by the American Physical Society2024 
    more » « less