Publications

Order by: publication date number of citations

• The DarkSide-20k TPC and underground argon cryogenic system

  Thomas N. Thorpe on behalf of the DS-20k collaboration

  SciPost Phys. Proc. 12, 069 (2023) · published 5 July 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  DarkSide-20k (DS-20k) will exploit the physical and chemical properties of liquid argon (LAr) housed within a large dual-phase time project chamber (TPC) in its direct search for dark matter. The TPC will utilize a compact, integrated design with many novel features to enable the 20t fiducial volume of underground argon. Underground Argon (UAr) is sourced from underground CO$_2$ wells and depleted in the radioactive isotope $^{39}$Ar, greatly enhancing the experimental sensitivity to dark matter interactions. Sourcing and transporting the $\mathcal{O}$(100t) of UAr for (DS-20k) is costly, and a dedicated single-closed-loop cryogenic system has been designed, constructed, and tested to handle the valuable UAr. We present an overview of the (DS-20k) TPC design and the first results from the UAr cryogenic system.

  1 citation

• Disentangling sub-GeV dark matter from the diffuse supernova neutrino background using Hyper-Kamiokande

  Sandra Robles

  SciPost Phys. Proc. 12, 065 (2023) · published 5 July 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  The upcoming Hyper-Kamiokande (HyperK) experiment is expected to detect the Diffuse Supernova Neutrino Background (DSNB). This requires to ponder all possible sources of background. Sub-GeV dark matter (DM) which annihilates into neutrinos is a potential background that has not been considered so far. We simulate DSNB and DM signals, as well as backgrounds in the HyperK detector. We find that DM-induced neutrinos could indeed alter the extraction of the correct values of the parameters of interest for DSNB physics. Since the DSNB is an isotropic signal, and DM originates primarily from the Galactic centre, we show that this effect could be alleviated with an on-off analysis.

  1 citation

• Muon measurements at the Pierre Auger Observatory

  Dariusz Góra

  SciPost Phys. Proc. 15, 020 (2024) · published 3 April 2024 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  The Pierre Auger Observatory is the world's largest detector for observation of ultra-high-energy cosmic rays (UHECRs) (above the energy of $10^{17}$ eV). It consists of a Fluorescence Detector (FD) and an array of particle detectors known as the Surface Detector (SD). Observations of extensive air showers by the Observatory can be used to probe hadronic interactions at high energy, in a kinematic and energy region inaccessible to experiments at man-made accelerators and to measure the muon component of the shower. Air showers induced by different primaries have different muon contents. With increasing mass of the primary cosmic ray particle, it is expected that the muon content in the corresponding air showers should also increase. Therefore, the determination of the muon component in the air shower is crucial to infer the mass of the primary particle. This is a key ingredient in the searches conducted to pinpoint the sources of UHECRs. Recent results obtained from the Pierre Auger Observatory and other experiments indicate that all the shower simulations underestimate the number of muons in the showers compared to the data. This is the so-called muon deficit. In this paper we briefly review the muon measurements, and present in more detail recent results on fluctuations in the muon number. These results provide new insights into the origin of the muon deficit in air shower simulations and constrain the models of hadronic interactions at ultrahigh energies. With the current design of the surface detectors it is also difficult to reliably separate the contributions of muons to the SD signal from the contributions of photons, electrons, and positrons. Therefore, we also present a new method to extract the muon component of the signal time traces recorded by each SD station using recurrent neural networks. The combination of such algorithms, with the future data collected by the upgraded Pierre Auger Observatory, will be a major step forward, as we are likely to achieve an unprecedented resolution in mass estimation on an event-by-event basis.

• GRAND: A Giant Radio Array for Neutrino Detection

  Charles Timmermans for the GRAND collaboration

  SciPost Phys. Proc. 1, 042 (2019) · published 21 February 2019 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  GRAND will be a distributed set of about 20 arrays of radio antennas, totalling 200,000 km2. We aim to study the ultra high energy universe through the detection of neutrinos, photons and cosmic rays at energies at the EeV scale. In addition GRAND will be used to study astronomical objects like FRBs and GRBs. We will describe the physics motivation, the detection strategy, the first stages of GRAND and the path to creating the complete setup.

• Properties of non-relativistic string theory

  E.A. Bergshoeff, J. Lahnsteiner, L. Romano, C. Simsek

  SciPost Phys. Proc. 4, 001 (2021) · published 13 August 2021 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We show how Newton-Cartan geometry can be generalized to String Newton-Cartan geometry which is the geometry underlying non-relativistic string theory. Several salient properties of non-relativistic string theory in this geometric background are presented and a discussion of possible research for the future is outlined.

• From Rindler fluid to dark fluid on the holographic cutoff surface

  Rong-Gen Cai, Gansukh Tumurtushaa, Yun-Long Zhang

  SciPost Phys. Proc. 4, 003 (2021) · published 13 August 2021 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  As an approximation to the near horizon regime of black holes, the Rindler fluid was proposed on an accelerating cutoff surface in the flat spacetime. The concept of the Rindler fluid was then generalized into a flat bulk with the cutoff surface of the induced de Sitter and FRW universe, such that an effective description of dark fluid in the accelerating universe can be investigated.

• Two faces of Hawking radiation and thin-shell emission: pair-creation vs. tunneling

  Dong-han Yeom

  SciPost Phys. Proc. 4, 004 (2021) · published 13 August 2021 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We first revisit Hartle and Hawking's path integral derivation of Hawking radiation. In the first point of view, we interpret that a particle-antiparticle pair is created and the negative energy antiparticle falls into the black hole. On the other point of view, a particle inside the horizon, or beyond the Einstein-Rosen bridge, tunnels to outside the horizon, where this computation requires the analytic continuation of the time. These two faces of the Hawking radiation process can be extended to not only particles but also fields. As a concrete example, we study the thin-shell tunneling process; by introducing the antishell as a negative tension shell, we can give the consistent interpretation for two pictures, where one is a tunneling from inside to outside the horizon using instantons, while the other is a shell-antishell pair-creation. This shows that the Euclidean path integral indeed carries vast physical implications not only for perturbative, but also for non-perturbative processes.

• Position-dependent mass quantum systems and ADM formalism

  Davood Momeni

  SciPost Phys. Proc. 4, 009 (2021) · published 13 August 2021 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  The classical Einstein-Hilbert (EH) action for general relativity (GR) is shown to be formally analogous to the classical system with position-dependent mass (PDM) models. The analogy is developed and used to build the covariant classical Hamiltonian as well as defining an alternative phase portrait for GR. The set of associated Hamilton's equations in the phase space is presented as a first-order system dual to the Einstein field equations. Following the principles of quantum mechanics, I build a canonical theory for the classical general. A fully consistent quantum Hamiltonian for GR is constructed based on adopting a high dimensional phase space. It is observed that the functional wave equation is timeless. As a direct application, I present an alternative wave equation for quantum cosmology. In comparison to the standard Arnowitt-Deser-Misner(ADM) decomposition and quantum gravity proposals, I extended my analysis beyond the covariant regime when the metric is decomposed into the 3+1 dimensional ADM decomposition. I showed that an equal dimensional phase space can be obtained if one applies ADM decomposed metric.

• Linear stability of Einstein and de Sitter universes in the quadratic theory of modified gravity

  Mudhahir Al-Ajmi

  SciPost Phys. Proc. 4, 012 (2021) · published 13 August 2021 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  We consider the Einstein static and the de Sitter universe solutions and examine their instabilities in a subclass of quadratic modified theories for gravity. This modification proposed by Nash is an attempt to generalize general relativity. Interestingly, we discover that the Einstein static universe is unstable in the context of the modified gravity. In contrast to Einstein static universe, the de Sitter universe remains stable under metric perturbation up to the second order.

• Indirect searches for dark matter with the nEDM spectrometer

  S. Roccia, G. Zsigmond on behalf of the nEDM collaboration at PSI

  SciPost Phys. Proc. 5, 028 (2021) · published 6 September 2021 | Toggle abstract · pdf

  The nEDM apparatus at PSI has been used to search for different dark matter signatures utilizing its high sensitivity to shifts in the neutron precession frequency and its well-controlled low magnetic field at the microT level. Such a shift could be interpreted as a consequence of a short-range spin-dependent interaction that could possibly be mediated by axions or axion-like particles, or as an axion-induced oscillating electric dipole moment of the neutron. Another search, based on so-called UCN disappearance measurements, targeted previously reported signals of neutron to mirror-neutron oscillations. These dark matter searches confirmed and improved previous results, as detailed in this review.