Related papers: Low-Energy Radiative Backgrounds in CCD-Based Dark…
The Dark Matter Time Projection Chamber (DMTPC) collaboration is developing a low pressure gas TPC for detecting Weakly Interacting Massive Particle (WIMP)-nucleon interactions. Optical readout with CCD cameras allows for the detection of…
Models for light dark matter particles with masses below 1 GeV/c$^2$ are a natural and well-motivated alternative to so-far unobserved weakly interacting massive particles. Gram-scale cryogenic calorimeters provide the required detector…
Mirror dark matter offers a framework to explain the existing dark matter direct detection experiments, including the impressive DAMA annual modulation signal. Here we examine the implications of mirror dark matter for experiments like…
In the recent years, many low-threshold dark matter (DM) direct detection experiments have reported the observation of unexplained excesses of events at low energies. Exemplary for these, the experiment CRESST has detected unidentified…
We investigate the power of low-energy, high-luminosity electron--positron colliders to probe hidden sectors with a mass below ~10 GeV that couple to Standard Model particles through a light mediator. Such sectors provide well-motivated…
We show that the event excess observed by the IceCube collaboration at TeV--PeV energies, usually interpreted as evidence for astrophysical neutrinos, can be explained alternatively by the scattering of highly boosted dark matter particles.…
We report results from a reanalysis of data from the Cryogenic Dark Matter Search (CDMS II) experiment at the Soudan Underground Laboratory. Data taken between October 2006 and September 2008 using eight germanium detectors are reanalyzed…
Recently the CRESST collaboration has published the long anticipated results of their direct Dark Matter (DM) detection experiment with a CaWO_4 target. The number of observed events exceeds known backgrounds at more than 4 sigma…
Indirect searches for Dark Matter (DM) particles with mass in the MeV -- GeV scale have received significant attention lately. Pair-annihilations of such DM particles in the Galaxy can give rise to (at the same time) MeV to GeV…
Recent years have seen dramatic improvements in the sensitivity of electron-based direct detection experiments. Typically, the sensitivity to dark matter scattering is determined in the light and heavy mediator mass limits. In this paper we…
The light yield of a small undoped cesium iodide (CsI) crystal directly coupled with two silicon photomultipliers (SiPMs) at about 77~Kelvin was measured to be $43.0 \pm 1.1$~photoelectrons (PE) per keV electron-equivalent (keV$_\text{ee}$)…
We describe a novel search for MeV-to-GeV-mass dark matter, in which the dark matter scatters off electrons in a scintillating target. The excitation and subsequent de-excitation of the electron produces one or more photons, which could be…
Experiments aiming to directly detect dark matter through particle recoils can achieve energy thresholds of $\mathcal{O}(1\,\mathrm{eV})$. In this regime, ionization signals from small-angle Compton scatters of environmental $\gamma$-rays…
In our work on the development of a model-independent data analysis method for estimating the spin-independent (SI) scalar coupling of Weakly Interacting Massive Particles (WIMPs) on nucleons by using measured recoil energies from direct…
The DAMIC-M (DArk Matter In CCDs at Modane) experiment will use skipper CCDs to search for low mass (sub-GeV) dark matter underground at the Laboratoire Souterrain de Modane (LSM) in France. With about 1 kg of silicon target mass and…
We calculate the scattering rate of sub-GeV dark matter in solid-state targets for spin-dependent dark matter -- nucleon interactions. For dark matter particles with mass below 100 MeV, the scattering occurs predominantly through incoherent…
We report on a search for sub-GeV dark matter upscattered via the solar reflection mechanism in the heavy mediator scenario. Under the Standard Halo Model, keV to MeV dark matter produces nuclear recoils with energies below the detection…
We extend the study of the performance of a prototype two-phase liquid xenon WIMP dark matter detector to recoil energies below 20 keV. We demonstrate a new method for obtaining the best estimate of the energies of events using a calibrated…
In this paper, we study the recent excess of low energy events observed by the CoGeNT collaboration and the annual modulation reported by the DAMA/LIBRA collaboration, and discuss whether these signals could both be the result of the same…
Traditional direct searches for dark matter, looking for nuclear recoils in deep underground detectors, are challenged by an almost complete loss of sensitivity for light dark matter particles. Consequently, there is a significant effort in…