No Arabic abstract
Astrophysical observations strongly suggest that non-luminous, nonbaryonic components, so called Dark Matter, may constitute most of the matter in the Universe. The Cryogenic Dark Matter Search (CDMS) experiment is designed to detect Dark Matter interaction events through nuclear recoils from elastic scattering. The detector is capable of reading out both phonon and ionization energy of an interaction in Ge or Si crystals. We present results from the CDMS five-tower detector arrays. The data were collected in the period between October 2006 and July 2007 (with an effective exposure of 121.3 kg-days). No WIMP signal was observed. The results, when combined with previous CDMS Soudan data, set a 90% confidence level upper bound on the WIMP-nucleon cross section of $4.6times 10^{-44}$ cm$^2$ at 60 Gev/c$^2$ WIMP mass.
We report results of a search for Weakly Interacting Massive Particles (WIMPs) with the Si detectors of the CDMS II experiment. This report describes a blind analysis of the first data taken with CDMS IIs full complement of detectors in 2006-2007; results from this exposure using the Ge detectors have already been presented. We observed no candidate WIMP-scattering events in an exposure of 55.9 kg-days before analysis cuts, with an expected background of ~1.1 events. The exposure of this analysis is equivalent to 10.3 kg-days over a recoil energy range of 7-100 keV for an ideal Si detector and a WIMP mass of 10 GeV/c2. These data set an upper limit of 1.7x10-41 cm2 on the WIMP-nucleon spin-independent cross section of a 10 GeV/c2 WIMP. These data exclude parameter space for spin-independent WIMP-nucleon elastic scattering that is relevant to recent searches for low-mass WIMPs.
We report results of a search for Weakly Interacting Massive Particles (WIMPS) with the silicon detectors of the CDMS II experiment. This blind analysis of 140.2 kg-days of data taken between July 2007 and September 2008 revealed three WIMP-candidate events with a surface-event background estimate of 0.41^{+0.20}_{-0.08}(stat.)^{+0.28}_{-0.24}(syst.). Other known backgrounds from neutrons and 206Pb are limited to < 0.13 and <0.08 events at the 90% confidence level, respectively. The exposure of this analysis is equivalent to 23.4 kg-days for a recoil energy range of 7-100 keV for a WIMP of mass 10 GeV/c2. The probability that the known backgrounds would produce three or more events in the signal region is 5.4%. A profile likelihood ratio test of the three events that includes the measured recoil energies gives a 0.19% probability for the known-background-only hypothesis when tested against the alternative WIMP+background hypothesis. The highest likelihood occurs for a WIMP mass of 8.6 GeV/c2 and WIMP-nucleon cross section of 1.9e-41 cm2.
Open questions are still present in fundamental Physics and Cosmology, like the nature of Dark Matter, the matter-antimatter asymmetry and the validity of the particle interaction Standard Model. Addressing these questions requires a new generation of massive particle detectors exploring the subatomic and astrophysical worlds. ICARUS T600 is the first large mass (760 ton) example of a novel detector generation able to combine the imaging capabilities of the old famous bubble chamber with an excellent energy measurement in huge electronic detectors. ICARUS T600 now operates at the Gran Sasso underground laboratory, studying cosmic rays, neutrino oscillation and proton decay. Physical potentialities of this novel telescope are presented through few examples of neutrino interactions reconstructed with unprecedented details. Detector design and early operation are also reported.
We report on the first axion search results from the Cryogenic Dark Matter Search (CDMS) experiment at the Soudan Underground Laboratory. An energy threshold of 2 keV for electron-recoil events allows a search for possible solar axion conversion into photons or local Galactic axion conversion into electrons in the germanium crystal detectors. The solar axion search sets an upper limit on the Primakov coupling $g_{agammagamma}$ of 2.4$ times 10^{-9}$ GeV$^{-1}$ at the 95% confidence level for an axion mass less than 0.1 keV/c$^2$. This limit benefits from the first precise measurement of the absolute crystal plane orientations in this type of experiment. The Galactic axion search analysis sets a world-leading experimental upper limit on the axio-electric coupling $g_{abar{e}e}$ of 1.4$ times 10^{-12}$ at the 90 % confidence level for an axion mass of 2.5 keV/c$^2$. This analysis excludes an interpretation of the DAMA annual modulation result in terms of Galactic axion interactions for axion masses above 1.4 keV/c$^2$.
We report results from a reanalysis of data from the Cryogenic Dark Matter Search (CDMS II) experiment at the Soudan Underground Laboratory. Data taken between October 2006 and September 2008 using eight germanium detectors are reanalyzed with a lowered, 2 keV recoil-energy threshold, to give increased sensitivity to interactions from Weakly Interacting Massive Particles (WIMPs) with masses below ~10 GeV/c^2. This analysis provides stronger constraints than previous CDMS II results for WIMP masses below 9 GeV/c^2 and excludes parameter space associated with possible low-mass WIMP signals from the DAMA/LIBRA and CoGeNT experiments.