Ultra-low energy calibration of xenon-based dark matter detectors

Xenon-based experiments have demonstrated world leading sensitivity in searches for medium-to-high mass WIMP dark matter interactions. Recent developments suggest that these experiments may also be sensitive to low mass WIMPs, which requires xenon detectors to be calibrated at very low energies. In this talk, I will discuss a series of efforts made by the LLNL noble liquid group to measure the ionization yield of xenon nuclear recoils that may be produced by WIMP interactions. Using a low-energy pulsed neutron beam and a compact xenon time projection chamber, we measured neutron-induced xenon recoils between 0.3keV and 6 keV, and studied the yield dependence on the drift electric field between 200V/cm and 6.3kV/cm. The impact of this result on current and future dark matter searches will be discussed.

Speaker: Jingke Xu, Lawrence Livermore National Labs