Readout strategies for directional dark matter detection beyond the neutrino background
The search for weakly interacting massive particles (WIMPs) by direct detection faces an en- croaching background due to coherent neutrino-nucleus scattering. As the sensitivity of these ex- periments improves, the question of how to best distinguish a dark matter signal from neutrinos will become i...
| Main Authors: | , , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
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American Physical Society
2015
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| Online Access: | https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/34503/ |
| _version_ | 1848794869954248704 |
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| author | O'Hare, Ciaran A.J. Green, Anne M. Billard, Julien Figueroa-Feliciano, Encetali Strigari, Louis E. |
| author_facet | O'Hare, Ciaran A.J. Green, Anne M. Billard, Julien Figueroa-Feliciano, Encetali Strigari, Louis E. |
| author_sort | O'Hare, Ciaran A.J. |
| building | Nottingham Research Data Repository |
| collection | Online Access |
| description | The search for weakly interacting massive particles (WIMPs) by direct detection faces an en- croaching background due to coherent neutrino-nucleus scattering. As the sensitivity of these ex- periments improves, the question of how to best distinguish a dark matter signal from neutrinos will become increasingly important. A proposed method of overcoming this so-called “neutrino floor” is to utilize the directional signature that both neutrino and dark matter induced recoils possess. We show that directional experiments can indeed probe WIMP-nucleon cross-sections below the neutrino floor with little loss in sensitivity due to the neutrino background. In particular we find at low WIMP masses (around 6 GeV) the discovery limits for directional detectors penetrate be- low the non-directional limit by several orders of magnitude. For high WIMP masses (around 100 GeV), the non-directional limit is overcome by a factor of a few. Furthermore we show that even for directional detectors which can only measure 1- or 2-dimensional projections of the 3-dimensional recoil track, the discovery potential is only reduced by a factor of 3 at most. We also demonstrate that while the experimental limitations of directional detectors, such as sense recognition and finite angular resolution, have a detrimental effect on the discovery limits, it is still possible to overcome the ultimate neutrino background faced by non-directional detectors. |
| first_indexed | 2025-11-14T19:23:03Z |
| format | Article |
| id | nottingham-34503 |
| institution | University of Nottingham Malaysia Campus |
| institution_category | Local University |
| last_indexed | 2025-11-14T19:23:03Z |
| publishDate | 2015 |
| publisher | American Physical Society |
| recordtype | eprints |
| repository_type | Digital Repository |
| spelling | nottingham-345032020-05-04T17:16:51Z https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/34503/ Readout strategies for directional dark matter detection beyond the neutrino background O'Hare, Ciaran A.J. Green, Anne M. Billard, Julien Figueroa-Feliciano, Encetali Strigari, Louis E. The search for weakly interacting massive particles (WIMPs) by direct detection faces an en- croaching background due to coherent neutrino-nucleus scattering. As the sensitivity of these ex- periments improves, the question of how to best distinguish a dark matter signal from neutrinos will become increasingly important. A proposed method of overcoming this so-called “neutrino floor” is to utilize the directional signature that both neutrino and dark matter induced recoils possess. We show that directional experiments can indeed probe WIMP-nucleon cross-sections below the neutrino floor with little loss in sensitivity due to the neutrino background. In particular we find at low WIMP masses (around 6 GeV) the discovery limits for directional detectors penetrate be- low the non-directional limit by several orders of magnitude. For high WIMP masses (around 100 GeV), the non-directional limit is overcome by a factor of a few. Furthermore we show that even for directional detectors which can only measure 1- or 2-dimensional projections of the 3-dimensional recoil track, the discovery potential is only reduced by a factor of 3 at most. We also demonstrate that while the experimental limitations of directional detectors, such as sense recognition and finite angular resolution, have a detrimental effect on the discovery limits, it is still possible to overcome the ultimate neutrino background faced by non-directional detectors. American Physical Society 2015-09-17 Article PeerReviewed O'Hare, Ciaran A.J., Green, Anne M., Billard, Julien, Figueroa-Feliciano, Encetali and Strigari, Louis E. (2015) Readout strategies for directional dark matter detection beyond the neutrino background. Physical Review D, 92 (6). 063518. ISSN 1550-2368 http://journals.aps.org/prd/abstract/10.1103/PhysRevD.92.063518 doi:10.1103/PhysRevD.92.063518 doi:10.1103/PhysRevD.92.063518 |
| spellingShingle | O'Hare, Ciaran A.J. Green, Anne M. Billard, Julien Figueroa-Feliciano, Encetali Strigari, Louis E. Readout strategies for directional dark matter detection beyond the neutrino background |
| title | Readout strategies for directional dark matter detection beyond the neutrino background |
| title_full | Readout strategies for directional dark matter detection beyond the neutrino background |
| title_fullStr | Readout strategies for directional dark matter detection beyond the neutrino background |
| title_full_unstemmed | Readout strategies for directional dark matter detection beyond the neutrino background |
| title_short | Readout strategies for directional dark matter detection beyond the neutrino background |
| title_sort | readout strategies for directional dark matter detection beyond the neutrino background |
| url | https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/34503/ https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/34503/ https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/34503/ |