Hunting axion dark matter with anti-ferromagnets: a case study with nickel oxide

Fuente: arXiv
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Main Authors: Catinari, Pier Giuseppe, Esposito, Angelo, Pavaskar, Shashin
Format: Preprint
Published: 2024
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author Catinari, Pier Giuseppe
Esposito, Angelo
Pavaskar, Shashin
author_facet Catinari, Pier Giuseppe
Esposito, Angelo
Pavaskar, Shashin
contents We show that nickel oxide, which is already a very promising target to look for sub-MeV dark matter scattering, can be employed to hunt axion dark matter, with masses in the meV range and couplings to electrons allowing them to potentially be QCD axions. We describe the interactions between axions and the collective excitations of nickel oxide in terms of a universal effective field theory, built solely out of symmetry arguments. The processes of conversion into one or two excitations provide, respectively, a narrowband and a broadband channel for the axion search, and the possibility of varying an external magnetic field up to a phase transition point allows to cover a large portion of a yet unexplored parameter space, reaching axion masses down to few fractions of an meV. Our results underline nickel oxide as an ideal candidate for a multi-purpose target for light dark matter searches.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2411_11971
institution arXiv
publishDate 2024
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Hunting axion dark matter with anti-ferromagnets: a case study with nickel oxide
Catinari, Pier Giuseppe
Esposito, Angelo
Pavaskar, Shashin
High Energy Physics - Phenomenology
Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics
We show that nickel oxide, which is already a very promising target to look for sub-MeV dark matter scattering, can be employed to hunt axion dark matter, with masses in the meV range and couplings to electrons allowing them to potentially be QCD axions. We describe the interactions between axions and the collective excitations of nickel oxide in terms of a universal effective field theory, built solely out of symmetry arguments. The processes of conversion into one or two excitations provide, respectively, a narrowband and a broadband channel for the axion search, and the possibility of varying an external magnetic field up to a phase transition point allows to cover a large portion of a yet unexplored parameter space, reaching axion masses down to few fractions of an meV. Our results underline nickel oxide as an ideal candidate for a multi-purpose target for light dark matter searches.
title Hunting axion dark matter with anti-ferromagnets: a case study with nickel oxide
topic High Energy Physics - Phenomenology
Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2411.11971