English

Discovering QCD-Coupled Axion Dark Matter with Polarization Haloscopes

High Energy Physics - Phenomenology 2023-08-28 v2 High Energy Physics - Experiment Nuclear Theory Instrumentation and Detectors

Abstract

In the presence of QCD axion dark matter, atoms acquire time-dependent electric dipole moments. This effect gives rise to an oscillating current in a nuclear spin-polarized dielectric, which can resonantly excite an electromagnetic mode of a microwave cavity. We show that with existing technology such a "polarization haloscope" can explore orders of magnitude of new parameter space for QCD-coupled axions. If any cavity haloscope detects a signal from the axion-photon coupling, an upgraded polarization haloscope has the unique ability to test whether it arises from the QCD axion.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2209.12901,
  title  = {Discovering QCD-Coupled Axion Dark Matter with Polarization Haloscopes},
  author = {Asher Berlin and Kevin Zhou},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2209.12901},
  year   = {2023}
}

Comments

11 pages, 2 figures. v2: discussion expanded, matches journal version

R2 v1 2026-06-28T02:08:09.570Z