Detecting Nanometer-Scale New Forces with Coherent Neutron Scattering
arXiv:2303.17744 · doi:10.1103/PhysRevD.108.055005
Abstract
Significant effort has been devoted to searching for new fundamental forces of nature. At short length scales (below approximately 10 nm), the strongest experimental constraints come from neutron scattering from individual nuclei in gases. The leading experiments at longer length scales instead measure forces between macroscopic test masses. We propose a hybrid of these two approaches: scattering neutrons off of a target that has spatial structure at nanoscopic length scales. Such structures will give a coherent enhancement to small-angle scattering, where the new force is most significant. This can considerably improve the sensitivity of neutron scattering experiments for new forces in the 0.1 - 100 nm range. We discuss the backgrounds due to Standard Model interactions and a variety of potential target structures that could be used, estimating the resulting sensitivities. We show that, using only one day of beam time at a modern neutron scattering facility, our proposal has the potential to detect new forces as much as two orders of magnitude beyond current laboratory constraints at the appropriate length scales.
arXiv comment42 pages, 7 figures
References in corpus (41)
- Phenomenology, Astrophysics and Cosmology of Theories with Sub-Millimeter Dimensions and TeV Scale Quantum Gravity
- New Developments in the Casimir Effect
- Tests of the Gravitational Inverse-Square Law
- Stellar cooling bounds on new light particles: plasma mixing effects
- Experimental Status of Gravitational-Strength Forces in the Sub-Centimeter Regime
- New Test of the Gravitational Law at Separations down to 52 m
- Constraining New Forces in the Casimir Regime Using the Isoelectronic Technique
- Review of short-range gravity experiments in the LHC era
- Neutron scattering and extra short range interactions
- The Need for Purely Laboratory-Based Axion-Like Particle Searches
- Stronger limits on hypothetical Yukawa interactions in the 40--8000 nm range
- Compatibility of the chameleon-field model with fifth-force experiments, cosmology, and PVLAS and CAST results
- Limits on a CP-violating scalar axion-nucleon interaction
- Compatibility of CAST search with axion-like interpretation of PVLAS results
- Probing Sub-Micron Forces by Interferometry of Bose-Einstein Condensed Atoms
- Evading Astrophysical Constraints on Axion-Like Particles
- New origin for approximate symmetries from distant breaking in extra dimensions
- Fat Gravitons, the Cosmological Constant and Sub-millimeter Tests
- Neutron Thermal Cross Sections, Westcott Factors, Resonance Integrals, Maxwellian Averaged Cross Sections and Astrophysical Reaction Rates Calculated from Major Evaluated Data Libraries
- Cornering the axion with CP-violating interactions
- Exploring the robustness of stellar cooling constraints on light particles
- Constraints on New Gravitylike Forces in the Nanometer Range
- Reconciling the CAST and PVLAS Results
- Constraints on new interactions from neutron scattering experiments
- Evading the astrophysical limits on light pseudoscalars
- Stellar limits on scalars from electron-nucleus bremsstrahlung
- Dark Matter and XENON1T Excess from Extended Standard Model
- Determination of the effective transverse coherence of the neutron wave packet as employed in reflectivity investigations of condensed matter structures Part I: Measurements
- A Search for deviations from the inverse square law of gravity at nm range using a pulsed neutron beam
- Search for non-Newtonian interactions at micrometer scale with a levitated test mass
- Interpreting the Neutron's Electric Form Factor: Rest Frame Charge Distribution or Foldy Term?
- Pendellösung Interferometry Probes the Neutron Charge Radius, Lattice Dynamics, and Fifth Forces
- Feebly Interacting Gauge Boson Warm Dark Matter and XENON1T Anomaly
- Bounds on new light particles from high-energy and very small momentum transfer np elastic scattering data
- Prospects for Searching Thermal Effects, Non-Newtonian Gravity and Axion-Like Particles: Cannex Test of the Quantum Vacuum
- Dark Matter Axions, Non-Newtonian Gravity and Constraints on them from Recent Measurement of the Casimir Force in the Micrometer Separation Range
- Neutron charge radius and the Dirac equation
- Searching for New Interactions at Sub-micron Scale Using the Mossbauer Effect
- Analytical evaluation of atomic form factors: application to Rayleigh scattering
- Experimental Search for Non-Newtonian Forces in the Nanometer Scale with Slow Neutrons
- Equivalence Principle tests, Equivalence theorems and New long-range forces