The Cryogenic Dark Matter Search (CDMS-II) Experiment - First Results from the Soudan Mine

The Cryogenic Dark Matter Search (CDMS-II) Experiment - First Results from the Soudan Mine PDF Author: Clarence Leeder Chang
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Languages : en
Pages : 0

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The Cryogenic Dark Matter Search (CDMS-II) Experiment - First Results from the Soudan Mine

The Cryogenic Dark Matter Search (CDMS-II) Experiment - First Results from the Soudan Mine PDF Author: Clarence Leeder Chang
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ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Cryogenic Dark Matter Search (CDMS)

Cryogenic Dark Matter Search (CDMS) PDF Author:
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Category :
Languages : en
Pages :

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Deciphering the nature of dark matter has great scientific importance. A leading hypothesis is that dark matter is made of Weakly Interactive Massive Particles (WIMPs), which may result from supersymmetry or additional spatial dimensions. The underground search for elastic scattering of WIMPs on suitable targets (the so-called 'direct detection') is currently led by the Cryogenic Dark Matter Search II (CDMS II) experiment. Its sensitivity is ten times better than any other experiment and we hope to obtain another factor ten in the coming two years. After a brief recall of our recent results, I will describe the complementarity between direct detection experiments, the LHC and the ILC and I will outline the role that SLAC could play in this SuperCDMS program.

Background Characterization and Discrimination in the Final Analysis of the CDMS II Phase of the Cryogenic Dark Matter Search

Background Characterization and Discrimination in the Final Analysis of the CDMS II Phase of the Cryogenic Dark Matter Search PDF Author:
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Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 176

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The Cryogenic Dark Matter Search (CDMS) is designed to detectWeakly-Interacting Massive Particles (WIMPs) in the Milky Way halo. The phase known as CDMS II was performed in the Soudan Underground Laboratory. The final set of CDMS II data, collected in 2007-8 and referred to as Runs 125-8, represents the largest exposure to date for the experiment. We seek collisions between WIMPs and atomic nuclei in disk-shaped germanium and silicon detectors. A key design feature is to keep the rate of collisions from known particles producing WIMP-like signals very small. The largest category of such background is interactions with electrons in the detectors that occur very close to one of the faces of the detector. The next largest category is collisions between energetic neutrons that bypass the experimental shielding and nuclei in the detectors. Analytical efforts to discriminate these backgrounds and to estimate the rate at which such discrimination fails have been refined and improved throughout each phase of CDMS. Next-generation detectors for future phases of CDMS require testing at cryogenic test facilities. One such facility was developed at the University of Minnesota in 2007 and has been used continuously since then to test detectors for the next phase of the experiment, known as SuperCDMS.

Cryogenic Dark Matter Search (CDMS II)

Cryogenic Dark Matter Search (CDMS II) PDF Author: Michael J. Attisha
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Category : Cosmology
Languages : en
Pages : 586

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Low-Mass Dark Matter Search Results and Radiogenic Backgrounds for the Cryogenic Dark Matter Search

Low-Mass Dark Matter Search Results and Radiogenic Backgrounds for the Cryogenic Dark Matter Search PDF Author:
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Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 437

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An ever-increasing amount of evidence suggests that approximately one quarter of the energy in the universe is composed of some non-luminous, and hitherto unknown, "dark matter". Physicists from numerous sub-fields have been working on and trying to solve the dark matter problem for decades. The common solution is the existence of some new type of elementary particle with particular focus on weakly interacting massive particles (WIMPs). One avenue of dark matter research is to create an extremely sensitive particle detector with the goal of directly observing the interaction of WIMPs with standard matter. The Cryogenic Dark Matter Search (CDMS) project operated at the Soudan Underground Laboratory from 2003-2015, under the CDMS II and SuperCDMS Soudan experiments, with this goal of directly detecting dark matter. The next installation, SuperCDMS SNOLAB, is planned for near-future operation. The reason the dark-matter particle has not yet been observed in traditional particle physics experiments is that it must have very small cross sections, thus making such interactions extremely rare. In order to identify these rare events in the presence of a background of known particles and interactions, direct detection experiments employ various types and amounts of shielding to prevent known backgrounds from reaching the instrumented detector(s). CDMS utilized various gamma and neutron shielding to such an effect that the shielding, and other experimental components, themselves were sources of background. These radiogenic backgrounds must be understood to have confidence in any WIMP-search result. For this dissertation, radiogenic background studies and estimates were performed for various analyses covering CDMS II, SuperCDMS Soudan, and SuperCDMS SNOLAB. Lower-mass dark matter t c2 inent in the past few years. The CDMS detectors can be operated in an alternative, higher-biased, mode v to decrease their energy thresholds and correspondingly increase their sensitivity to low-mass WIMPs. This is the CDMS low ionization threshold experiment (CDMSlite), which has pushed the frontier at lower WIMP masses. This dissertation describes the second run of CDMSlite at Soudan: its hardware, operations, analysis, and results. The results include new WIMP mass-cross section upper limits on the spin-independent and spin-dependent WIMP-nucleon interactions. Thanks to the lower background and threshold in this run compared to the first CDMSlite run, these limits are the most sensitive in the world below WIMP masses of ~4 GeV/c2. This demonstrates also the great promise and utility of the high-voltage operating mode in the SuperCDMS SNOLAB experiment.

First Results from the Cryogenic Dark Matter Search Experiment at the Deep Site

First Results from the Cryogenic Dark Matter Search Experiment at the Deep Site PDF Author:
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ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 454

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The Cryogenic Dark Matter Search (CDMS) experiment is designed to search for dark matter in the form of the Weakly Interacting Massive Particles (WIMPs). For this purpose, CDMS uses detectors based on crystals of Ge and Si, operated at the temperature of 20 mK, and providing a two-fold signature of an interaction: the ionization and the athermal phonon signals. The two signals, along with the passive and active shielding of the experimental setup, and with the underground experimental sites, allow very effective suppression and rejection of different types of backgrounds. This dissertation presents the commissioning and the results of the first WIMP-search run performed by the CDMS collaboration at the deep underground site at the Soudan mine in Minnesota. We develop different methods of suppressing the dominant background due to the electron-recoil events taking place at the detector surface and we apply these algorithms to the data set. These results place the world's most sensitive limits on the WIMP-nucleon spin-independent elastic-scattering cross-section. Finally, they examine the compatibility of the supersymmetric WIMP-models with the direct-detection experiments (such as CDMS) and discuss the implications of the new CDMS result on these models.

The Cryogenic Dark Matter Search

The Cryogenic Dark Matter Search PDF Author:
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ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 286

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The Cryogenic Dark Matter Search (CDMS) is searching for Weakly Interacting Massive Particles (WIMPs) with cryogenic particle detectors. These detectors have the ability to discriminate between nuclear recoil candidate and electron recoil background events by collecting both phonon and ionization energy from recoils in the detector crystals. The CDMS-II experiment has completed analysis of the first data runs with 30 semiconductor detectors at the Soudan Underground Laboratory, resulting in a world leading WIMP-nucleon spin-independent cross section limit for WIMP masses above 44 GeV/c2. As CDMS aims to achieve greater WIMP sensitivity, it is necessary to increase the detector mass and discrimination between signal and background events. Incomplete ionization collection results in the largest background in the CDMS detectors as this causes electron recoil background interactions to appear as false candidate events. Two primary causes of incomplete ionization collection are surface and bulk trapping. Recent work has been focused on reducing surface trapping through the modification of fabrication methods for future detectors. Analyzing data taken with test devices has shown that hydrogen passivation of the amorphous silicon blocking layer worsens surface trapping. Additional data has shown that the iron-ion implantation used to lower the critical temperature of the tungsten transition-edge sensors causes a degradation of the ionization collection. Using selective implantation on future detectors may improve ionization collection for events near the phonon side detector surface. Bulk trapping is minimized by neutralizing ionized lattice impurities. Detector investigations at testing facilities and in situ at the experimental site have provided methods to optimize the neutralization process and monitor running conditions to maintain full ionization collection. This work details my contribution to the 5-tower data taking, monitoring, and analysis effort as well as the SuperCDMS detector development with the focus on monitoring and improving ionization collection in the detectors.

The Cryogenic Dark Matter Search (CDMS)

The Cryogenic Dark Matter Search (CDMS) PDF Author: Peter David Barnes
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ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 464

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Background Reduction in Cryogenic Detectors

Background Reduction in Cryogenic Detectors PDF Author: Daniel A. Bauer
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Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 10

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This paper discusses the background reduction and rejection strategy of the Cryogenic Dark Matter Search (CDMS) experiment. Recent measurements of background levels from CDMS II at Soudan are presented, along with estimates for future improvements in sensitivity expected for a proposed SuperCDMS experiment at SNOLAB.

A Search for WIMP Dark Matter Using an Optimized Chi-square Technique on the Final Data from the Cryogenic Dark Matter Search Experiment (CDMS II).

A Search for WIMP Dark Matter Using an Optimized Chi-square Technique on the Final Data from the Cryogenic Dark Matter Search Experiment (CDMS II). PDF Author:
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ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 447

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This dissertation describes the results of a WIMP search using CDMS II data sets accumulated at the Soudan Underground Laboratory in Minnesota. Results from the original analysis of these data were published in 2009; two events were observed in the signal region with an expected leakage of 0.9 events. Further investigation revealed an issue with the ionization-pulse reconstruction algorithm leading to a software upgrade and a subsequent reanalysis of the data. As part of the reanalysis, I performed an advanced discrimination technique to better distinguish (potential) signal events from backgrounds using a 5-dimensional chi-square method. This dataanalysis technique combines the event information recorded for each WIMP-search event to derive a backgrounddiscrimination parameter capable of reducing the expected background to less than one event, while maintaining high efficiency for signal events. Furthermore, optimizing the cut positions of this 5-dimensional chi-square parameter for the 14 viable germanium detectors yields an improved expected sensitivity to WIMP interactions relative to previous CDMS results. This dissertation describes my improved (and optimized) discrimination technique and the results obtained from a blind application to the reanalyzed CDMS II WIMP-search data.