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Title: Results on low-mass weakly interacting massive particles from an 11 kg d target exposure of DAMIC at SNOLAB

Journal Article · · Physical Review Letters
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  1. Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico
  2. University of Michigan
  3. University of Chicago
  4. Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory
  5. Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México
  6. University of Washington
  7. Laboratoire de Physique Nucleaire et des Hautes Energies
  8. BATTELLE (PACIFIC NW LAB)
  9. Universitat Zurich
  10. Snolab
  11. SUBATECH
  12. Universidad de Cantabria
  13. Instituto de Fisica
+ Show Author Affiliations

We present constraints on the existence of weakly interacting massive particles (WIMPs) from a 11 kg-day target exposure of the DAMIC experiment at the SNOLAB underground laboratory. The observed energy spectrum and spatial distribution of ionization events with electron-equivalent energies $$>$$200 eV$$_{\rm ee}$$ in the DAMIC CCDs are consistent with backgrounds from natural radioactivity. An excess of ionization events is observed above the analysis threshold of 50 eV$$_{\rm ee}$$. While the origin of this low-energy excess requires further investigation, our data exclude spin-independent WIMP-nucleon scattering cross sections $$\sigma_{\chi-n}$$ as low as $$3\times 10^{-41}$$ cm$^2$ for WIMPs with masses $$m_{\chi}$$ from 7 to 10 GeV$$c^{-2}$$ . These results are the strongest constraints from a silicon target on the existence of WIMPs with $$m_{\chi}$$$$<$9 GeV$$c^{-2}$$ and are directly relevant to any dark matter interpretation of the excess of nuclear-recoil events observed by the CDMS silicon experiment in 2013.

Research Organization:
Pacific Northwest National Lab. (PNNL), Richland, WA (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE
DOE Contract Number:
AC05-76RL01830
OSTI ID:
1755917
Report Number(s):
PNNL-SA-155070
Journal Information:
Physical Review Letters, Vol. 125, Issue 24
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English

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Related Subjects

WIMP search
Dark Matter
DAMIC
SNOLAB