NEWS: Nuclear Emulsions for WIMP Search

Abstract

Nowadays there is compelling evidence for the existence of dark matter in the Universe. A general consensus has been expressed on the need for a directional sensitive detector to confirm, with a complementary approach, the candidates found in conventional searches and to finally extend their sensitivity beyond the limit of neutrino-induced background. We propose here the use of a detector based on nuclear emulsions to measure the direction of WIMP-induced nuclear recoils. The production of nuclear emulsion films with nanometric grains is established. Several measurement campaigns have demonstrated the capability of detecting sub-micrometric tracks left by low energy ions in such emulsion films. Innovative analysis technologies with fully automated optical microscopes have made it possible to achieve the track reconstruction for path lengths down to one hundred nanometers and there are good prospects to further exceed this limit. The detector concept we propose foresees the use of a bulk of nuclear emulsion films surrounded by a shield from environmental radioactivity, to be placed on an equatorial telescope in order to cancel out the effect of the Earth rotation, thus keeping the detector at a fixed orientation toward the expected direction of galactic WIMPs. We report the schedule and cost estimate for a one-kilogram mass pilot experiment, aiming at delivering the first results on the time scale of six years.

References in corpus (6)

• First results from the LUX dark matter experiment at the Sanford Underground Research Facility
• CoGeNT: A Search for Low-Mass Dark Matter using p-type Point Contact Germanium Detectors
• A facility to Search for Hidden Particles (SHiP) at the CERN SPS
• First Dark Matter Search Results from a Surface Run of the 10-L DMTPC Directional Dark Matter Detector
• First underground results with NEWAGE-0.3a direction-sensitive dark matter detector
• Intrinsic neutron background of nuclear emulsions for directional Dark Matter searches

Cited by in corpus (9)

• Dark matter direct-detection experiments
• Readout technologies for directional WIMP Dark Matter detection
• Dark Shards: velocity substructure from Gaia and direct searches for dark matter
• Gaseous and dual-phase time projection chambers for imaging rare processes
• Time-integrated directional detection of dark matter
• Simulations of the 3-Dimensional Velocity Distribution of Halo Weakly Interacting Massive Particles for Directional Dark Matter Detection Experiments
• Supernova neutrino physics with a nuclear emulsion detector
• Super resolution plasmonic imaging microscopy for submicron tracking emulsion detector
• Optical shape analysis based on discrete Fourier transform and second order moment calculation of the brightness distribution for the detection of sub-micron range low energy tracks