Latest results from the CDMS-II cold dark matter search

Conference · Fri Dec 01 04:00:00 EST 2006 · AIP Conference Proceedings

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1063/1.2355326· OSTI ID:1856017

Brink, P. L.

The CDMS-II collaboration’s Cold Dark Matter search presently sets the most competitive exclusion limit in the world for the direct detection of the hypothesized Weakly Interacting Massive Particles (WIMPs) that constitute the cold dark matter of the Universe. Our experiment utilizes Ge (and Si) crystals as the target detectors, each with a mass of 250 g (100 g) and cooled to 30 mK. To eliminate natural radioactive sources as background the experiment is conducted in a well-shielded environment in the Soudan Mine, Minnesota, and has been operating for the last two years. To aid in the identification of a possible WIMP-candidate event, the detectors are designed to measure both the ionization and athermal phonon signals produced by each candidate event. The athermal phonon signal is measured using superconducting aluminum films on the crystal surface connected to tungsten transition edge sensors. The latest WIMP-search results from Soudan will be presented, along with projections for the future.

• Research Organization: Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (FNAL), Batavia, IL (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE Office of Science (SC), High Energy Physics (HEP) (SC-25)
• DOE Contract Number: AC02-07CH11359
• OSTI ID: 1856017
• Report Number(s): FERMILAB-CONF-06-581; oai:inspirehep.net:736798
• Conference Information: Journal Name: AIP Conference Proceedings Journal Issue: 1 Journal Volume: 850
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

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79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS