Ebadi, Reza

Mathur, Anubhav

Tanin, Erwin H

Tailby, Nicholas D

Marshall, Mason C

Ravi, Aakash

Trubko, Raisa

Fu, Roger R

Phillips, David F

Rajendran, Surjeet

Walsworth, Ronald L

2021-07-30

<p>Self-interactions within the dark sector could clump dark matter into heavy composite states with low number density, leading to a highly suppressed event rate in existing direct detection experiments. However, the large interaction cross section between such ultraheavy dark matter (UHDM) and standard model matter results in a distinctive and compelling signature; long, straight damage tracks as they pass through and scatter with matter. In this work, we propose using geologically old quartz samples as largeexposure detectors for UHDM. We describe a high-resolution readout method based on electron microscopy, characterize the most favorable geological samples for this approach, and study its reach in a simple model of the dark sector. The advantage of this search strategy is twofold; the age of geological quartz compensates for the low number density of ultraheavy composite dark matter, and the distinct geometry of the damage track serves as a high-fidelity background rejection tool.</p>

Physical Review D, 104(1), p. 1-10

2470-0029

2470-0010

https://hdl.handle.net/1959.11/63222

American Physical Society

Attribution 4.0 International

Ultraheavy dark matter search with electron microscopy of geological quartz

Journal Article

Publication