Dark matter direct detection from the single phonon to the nuclear recoil regime

Abstract

In most direct detection experiments, the free nuclear recoil description of dark matter scattering breaks down for masses $\lesssim$ 100 MeV, or when the recoil energy is comparable to a few times the typical phonon energy. For dark matter lighter than 1 MeV, scattering via excitation of a single phonon dominates and has been computed previously, but for the intermediate mass range or higher detector thresholds, multiphonon processes dominate. We perform the first calculation of the scattering rate via multiphonon production for the entire keV-GeV dark matter mass range, assuming a harmonic crystal target. We provide an analytic description that connects the single phonon, multiphonon, and the nuclear recoil regimes. Our results are implemented in the public package $\text{DarkELF}$.

arXiv comment28 pages, 16 figures; journal version with minor updates

References in corpus (32)

• Light Dark Matter: Models and Constraints
• Migdal Effect in Dark Matter Direct Detection Experiments
• Detection of Light Dark Matter With Optical Phonons in Polar Materials
• On the Detectability of Light Dark Matter with Superfluid Helium
• First results from the NEWS-G direct dark matter search experiment at the LSM
• On electromagnetic contributions in WIMP quests
• Probing sub-GeV Dark Matter with conventional detectors
• Directional Detection of Light Dark Matter with Polar Materials
• Diamond Detectors for Direct Detection of Sub-GeV Dark Matter
• Light Dark Matter in Superfluid Helium: Detection with Multi-excitation Production
• Multi-Channel Direct Detection of Light Dark Matter: Target Comparison
• Multi-Channel Direct Detection of Light Dark Matter: Theoretical Framework
• SiC Detectors for Sub-GeV Dark Matter
• The Migdal effect in semiconductors
• A Path to the Direct Detection of sub-GeV Dark Matter Using Calorimetric Readout of a Superfluid ${}^4$He Target
• DarkELF: A python package for dark matter scattering in dielectric targets
• Dark matter-electron scattering in dielectrics
• Searches for light dark matter using condensed matter systems
• A Concept for A Dark Matter Detector Using Liquid Helium-4
• The role of ionization electrons in direct dark matter detection
• Effective Field Theory of Dark Matter Direct Detection With Collective Excitations
• Electrophobic Scalar Boson and Muonic Puzzles
• Multiphonon excitations from dark matter scattering in crystals
• Sub-MeV Dark Matter and the Goldstone Modes of Superfluid Helium
• Sub-GeV Dark Matter in Superfluid He-4: an Effective Theory Approach
• The Dark Matter Phonon Coupling
• Describing the Migdal effect with a bremsstrahlung-like process and many-body effects
• Searching for low mass dark matter via phonon creation in superfluid 4He
• Phonon-mediated Migdal effect in semiconductor detectors
• Directional detection of light dark matter from three-phonon events in superfluid ${}^4$He
• The Phonon Background from Gamma Rays in Sub-GeV Dark Matter Detectors
• Superfluid Effective Field Theory for Dark Matter Direct Detection

Cited by in corpus (7)

• Freezing-in hadrophilic dark matter at low reheating temperatures
• The Migdal Effect in Semiconductors for Dark Matter with Masses below $\sim$100 MeV
• Dark Matter Induced Power in Quantum Devices
• Energy loss in low energy nuclear recoils in dark matter detector materials
• Optimal anti-ferromagnets for light dark matter detection
• Chiral phonons as dark matter detectors
• Signatures and Detection Prospects for sub-GeV Dark Matter with Superfluid Helium