Directionality of nuclear recoils in a liquid argon time projection chamber
Abstract
The direct search for dark matter in the form of weakly interacting massive particles (WIMP) is performed by detecting nuclear recoils (NR) produced in a target material from the WIMP elastic scattering. A promising experimental strategy for direct dark matter search employs argon dual-phase time projection chambers (TPC). One of the advantages of the TPC is the capability to detect both the scintillation and charge signals produced by NRs. Furthermore, the existence of a drift electric field in the TPC breaks the rotational symmetry: the angle between the drift field and the momentum of the recoiling nucleus can potentially affect the charge recombination probability in liquid argon and then the relative balance between the two signal channels. This fact could make the detector sensitive to the directionality of the WIMP-induced signal, enabling unmistakable annual and daily modulation signatures for future searches aiming for discovery. The Recoil Directionality (ReD) experiment was designed to probe for such directional sensitivity. The TPC of ReD was irradiated with neutrons at the INFN Laboratori Nazionali del Sud, and data were taken with 72 keV NRs of known recoil directions. The direction-dependent liquid argon charge recombination model by Cataudella et al. was adopted and a likelihood statistical analysis was performed, which gave no indications of significant dependence of the detector response to the recoil direction. The aspect ratio R of the initial ionization cloud is estimated to be 1.037 +/- 0.027 and the upper limit is R < 1.072 with 90% confidence level
Keywords
Cite
@article{arxiv.2307.15454,
title = {Directionality of nuclear recoils in a liquid argon time projection chamber},
author = {20k Collaboration and P. Agnes and I. Ahmad and S. Albergo and I. F. M. Albuquerque and T. Alexander and A. K. Alton and P. Amaudruz and M. Atzori Corona and M. Ave and I. Ch. Avetisov and O. Azzolini and H. O. Back and Z. Balmforth and A. Barrado-Olmedo and P. Barrillon and A. Basco and G. Batignani and V. Bocci and W. M. Bonivento and B. Bottino and M. G. Boulay and J. Busto and M. Cadeddu and A. Caminata and N. Canci and G. Cappello and A. Capra and S. Caprioli and M. Caravati and N. Cargioli and M. Carlini and P. Castello and V. Cataudella and P. Cavalcante and S. Cavuoti and S. Cebrian and J. M. Cela Ruiz and S. Chashin and A. Chepurnov and E. Chyhyrynets and L. Cifarelli and D. Cintas and M. Citterio and B. Cleveland and V. Cocco and E. Conde Vilda and L. Consiglio and S. Copello and G. Covone and M. Czubak and M. D'Aniello and S. D'Auria and M. D. Da Rocha Rolo and S. Davini and A. de Candia and S. De Cecco and D. De Gruttola and G. De Filippis and D. Dell'Aquila and S. De Pasquale and G. De Rosa and G. Dellacasa and A. V. Derbin and A. Devoto and F. Di Capua and L. Di Noto and C. Dionisi and P. Di Stefano and G. Dolganov and F. Dordei and A. Elersich and E. Ellingwood and T. Erjavec and M. Fernandez Diaz and G. Fiorillo and P. Franchini and D. Franco and N. Funicello and F. Gabriele and D. Gahan and C. Galbiati and G. Gallina and G. Gallus and M. Garbini and P. Garcia Abia and A. Gendotti and C. Ghiano and C. Giganti and G. K. Giovanetti and V. Goicoechea Casanueva and A. Gola and G. Grauso and G. Grilli di Cortona and A. Grobov and M. Gromov and M. Guan and M. Guerzoni and M. Gulino and C. Guo and B. R. Hackett and A. L. Hallin and A. Hamer and M. Haranczyk and T. Hessel and S. Hill and S. Horikawa and F. Hubaut and J. Hucker and T. Hugues and An. Ianni and V. Ippolito and C. Jillings and S. Jois and P. Kachru and N. Kemmerich and A. A. Kemp and C. L. Kendziora and M. Kimura and I. Kochanek and K. Kondo and G. Korga and S. Koulosousas and A. Kubankin and M. Kuss and M. Kuzniak and M. La Commara and M. Lai and E. Le Guirriec and E. Leason and A. Leoni and X. Li and L. Lidey and M. Lissia and L. Luzzi and O. Lychagina and O. Macfadyen and I. N. Machulin and S. Manecki and I. Manthos and L. Mapelli and A. Margotti and S. M. Marik and C. Mariani and J. Maricic and A. Marini and M. Martínez and C. J. Martoff and G. Matteucci and K. Mavrokoridis and A. B. McDonald and A. Messina and R. Milincic and A. Mitra and A. Moharana and J. Monroe and E. Moretti and M. Morrocchi and T. Mróz and V. N. Muratova and C. Muscas and P. Musico and R. Nania and M. Nessi and G. Nieradka and K. Nikolopoulos and J. Nowak and K. Olchansky and A. Oleinik and V. Oleynikov and P. Organtini and A. Ortiz de Solórzano and L. Pagani and M. Pallavicini and L. Pandola and E. Pantic and E. Paoloni and G. Paternoster and P. A. Pegoraro and K. Pelczar and V. Pesudo and S. Piacentini and N. Pino and A. Pocar and D. M. Poehlmann and S. Pordes and P. Pralavorio and D. Price and F. Ragusa and Y. Ramachers and M. Razeti and A. L. Renshaw and M. Rescigno and F. Retiere and L. P. Rignanese and C. Ripoli and A. Rivetti and A. Roberts and C. Roberts and J. Rode and G. Rogers and L. Romero and M. Rossi and A. Rubbia and M. A. Sabia and P. Salomone and E. Sandford and S. Sanfilippo and D. Santone and R. Santorelli and C. Savarese and E. Scapparone and G. Schillaci and F. G. Schuckman and G. Scioli and M. Simeone and P. Skensved and M. D. Skorokhvatov and O. Smirnov and T. Smirnova and B. Smith and A. Sosa and F. Spadoni and M. Spangenberg and R. Stefanizzi and A. Steri and V. Stornelli and S. Stracka and M. Stringer and S. Sulis and A. Sung and Y. Suvorov and A. M. Szelc and R. Tartaglia and A. Taylor and J. Taylor and S. Tedesco and G. Testera and K. Thieme and T. N. Thorpe and A. Tonazzo and A. Tricomi and E. V. Unzhakov and T. Vallivilayil John and M. Van Uffelen and T. Viant and S. Viel and R. B. Vogelaar and J. Vossebeld and M. Wada and M. B. Walczak and H. Wang and Y. Wang and S. Westerdale and L. Williams and I. Wingerter-Seez and R. Wojaczynski and Ma. M. Wojcik and T. Wright and Y. Xie and C. Yang and A. Zabihi and P. Zakhary and A. Zani and A. Zichichi and G. Zuzel and M. P. Zykova},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2307.15454},
year = {2024}
}
Comments
20 pages, 10 figures, submitted to Eur. Phys. J. C