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Axion Signal Search Using Hybrid Nuclear-Electronic Spin Systems

Quantum Physics 2026-03-24 v2 High Energy Physics - Experiment High Energy Physics - Phenomenology

Abstract

Conventional nuclear magnetic resonance searches for the galactic axion wind lose sensitivity at low frequencies due to the unfavourable scaling of inductive readout. Here, we propose a hybrid architecture where the hyperfine interaction transduces axion-driven nuclear precession into a high-bandwidth electron-spin readout channel. We demonstrate analytically that this dispersive upconversion preserves the specific sidereal and annual modulation signatures required to distinguish dark matter signals from instrumental backgrounds. When instantiated in a silicon 209Bi{ }^{209} \text{Bi} donor platform, the hybrid sensor is projected to outperform direct nuclear detection by more than an order of magnitude over the 1016106eV10^{-16}-10^{-6} \text{eV} wide mass range. With collective enhancement, the design reaches a 5σ5 \sigma sensitivity to DFSZ axion-nucleon couplings within one year, establishing hyperfine-mediated sensing as a competitive path for compact, solid-state dark matter searches.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2601.06816,
  title  = {Axion Signal Search Using Hybrid Nuclear-Electronic Spin Systems},
  author = {Xiangjun Tan and Zhanning Wang},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2601.06816},
  year   = {2026}
}