Cryogenic scintillation properties of <i>n</i>-type GaAs for the direct detection of MeV/c2 dark matter

Derenzo, Stephen E.; Bourret, Edith; Hanrahan, Stephen M.; Bizarri, Grégory

doi:10.1063/1.5018343

Cited by 25 publications

(16 citation statements)

References 42 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…As shown in Fig. 11, undoped CsI and NaI suffer from afterglow above ∼50 K [57]. One can thus maximize the light yield and minimize the afterglow of undoped CsI and NaI by operating them near 40 K. However, such a temperature is less convenient to maintain than 77 K, which can be simply achieved using liquid nitrogen as coolant.…”

Section: Operation Temperaturementioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Prospect of undoped inorganic crystals at 77 Kelvin for low-mass dark matter search at Spallation Neutron Source

et al. 2020

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Investigated in this work were sensitivities of a prototype detector for the detection of low-mass dark matter particles produced at the Spallation Neutron Source at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in 2 years of data taking. The presumed prototype consisted of 10 kg undoped CsI or NaI scintillation crystals directly coupled with SiPM arrays operated at 77 K. Compared to the COHERENT CsI(Na) detector, a much higher light yield was assumed for the prototype. An experiment with a cylindrical 1 kg undoped CsI crystal coupled directly to two photomultiplier tubes at about 77 K was conducted as the first step to verify the idea. A light yield of 26.0 ± 0.4 photoelectrons per keV electron-equivalent was achieved. This eliminated the concern of self light absorption in large crystals raised in some of the early studies.

show abstract

Section: Operation Temperaturementioning

confidence: 99%

“…The afterglow rates are from Ref. [57] [30,47] CsI(Tl) 600 [27] 550 [61] Undoped NaI 10 ∼ 15 [24,30,31] 375 [34,35] Undoped CsI 6 ∼ 36 [41,61,62] 305 ∼ 310 [38,41,61] afterglow distributions. Compromising a bit in the afterglow rate, the prototype can be operated at 77 K for convenience.…”

Section: Operation Temperaturementioning

confidence: 99%

Prospect of undoped inorganic crystals at 77 Kelvin for low-mass dark matter search at Spallation Neutron Source

et al. 2020

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…GaAs target: This approach seeks to employ the scintillator GaAs, a polar crystal, to obtain sensitivity to DPDM and DP-coupled LDM. Above roughly 1 eV energy deposition (about 1 MeV LDM mass), the material benefits from the high scintillation yield of GaAs [62], providing two detection channels: phonons via sensors deposited on the GaAs target, and photons via a separate Si 0V light detector. Two simultaneous detection channels may provide a way to reach the necessary eV threshold while vetoing environmental backgrounds expected at those energies.…”

Section: Cooperative Development Of Sapphire and Quartz With Tesserac...mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Stellar constraints are from Ref. [81] and direct detection constraints are from DAMIC[61], DarkSide-50 [82], SENSEI[62], SuperCDMS[68], XENON10[14,21], and XENON100 [82, 83].…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

A Strategy for Low-Mass Dark Matter Searches with Cryogenic Detectors in the SuperCDMS SNOLAB Facility

Collaboration¹,

Albakry²,

Alkhatib³

et al. 2022

Preprint

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The SuperCDMS Collaboration is currently building SuperCDMS SNOLAB, a dark matter search focused on nucleon-coupled dark matter in the 1-5 GeV mass range. Looking to the future, the Collaboration has developed a set of experience-based upgrade scenarios, as well as novel directions, to extend the search for dark matter using the SuperCDMS technology in the SNOLAB facility. The experienced-based scenarios are forecasted to probe many square decades of unexplored dark matter parameter space below 5 GeV, covering over 6 decades in mass: 1-100 eV for dark photons and axion-like particles, 1-100 MeV for dark-photoncoupled light dark matter, and 0.05-5 GeV for nucleon-coupled dark matter. They will reach the neutrino fog in the 0.5-5 GeV mass range and test a variety of benchmark models and sharp targets. The novel directions involve greater departures from current SuperCDMS technology but promise even greater reach in the long run, and their development must begin now for them to be available in a timely fashion.The experienced-based upgrade scenarios rely mainly on dramatic improvements in detector performance based on demonstrated scaling laws and reasonable extrapolations of current performance. Importantly, these improvements in detector performance obviate significant reductions in background levels beyond current expectations for the SuperCDMS SNOLAB experiment. Given that the dominant limiting backgrounds for SuperCDMS SNOLAB are cosmogenically created radioisotopes in the detectors, likely amenable only to isotopic purification and an underground detector life-cycle from before crystal growth to detector testing, the potential cost and time savings are enormous and the necessary improvements much easier to prototype.This executive summary outlines the detector upgrades, the new dark matter search modes they enable, the resulting expected science reach, and the novel directions under consideration. In the full document that follows, Section 1 reviews the SuperCDMS SNOLAB experiment under construction, including updated sensitivity expectations, along with a high-level overview of future opportunities, both experienced-based upgrades and novel directions. Section 2 provides detailed sensitivity forecasts for the experience-based upgrades. Section 3 presents specific activities being undertaken now to explore the delineated novel directions.

show abstract

“…NaI and CsI are two standard scintillators in use for numerous particle detection applications; their band gaps of 5.9 and 6.4 eV respectively are comparable to organic materials, but the response is isotropic. GaAs [222][223][224] is another promising scintillator detector. The lower band gap of 1.52 eV results in infrared rather than optical photons, which will not typically trigger a conventional PMT but may be detected with TESs in a method analogous to heat detection described above.…”

Section: Lightmentioning

confidence: 99%

Searches for light dark matter using condensed matter systems

Kahn,

Lin

2021

Preprint

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Identifying the nature of dark matter (DM) has long been a pressing question for particle physics. In the face of ever-more-powerful exclusions and null results from large-exposure searches for TeV-scale DM interacting with nuclei, a significant amount of attention has shifted to lighter (sub-GeV) DM candidates. Direct detection of the light dark matter in our galaxy by observing DM scattering off a target system requires new approaches compared to prior searches. Lighter DM particles have less available kinetic energy, and achieving a kinematic match between DM and the target mandates the proper treatment of collective excitations in condensed matter systems, such as charged quasiparticles or phonons. In this context, the condensed matter physics of the target material is crucial, necessitating an interdisciplinary approach. In this review, we provide a self-contained introduction to direct detection of keV-GeV DM with condensed matter systems. We give a brief survey of dark matter models and basics of condensed matter, while the bulk of the review deals with the theoretical treatment of DM-nucleon and DM-electron interactions. We also review recent experimental developments in detector technology, and conclude with an outlook for the field of sub-GeV DM detection over the next decade.

show abstract

Cryogenic scintillation properties of n-type GaAs for the direct detection of MeV/c2 dark matter

Cited by 25 publications

References 42 publications

Prospect of undoped inorganic crystals at 77 Kelvin for low-mass dark matter search at Spallation Neutron Source

Prospect of undoped inorganic crystals at 77 Kelvin for low-mass dark matter search at Spallation Neutron Source

A Strategy for Low-Mass Dark Matter Searches with Cryogenic Detectors in the SuperCDMS SNOLAB Facility

Searches for light dark matter using condensed matter systems

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About